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|LIBRilRYOFCONGIiESSj 






■NITED STATES OF AMKRJCA 



THE ROLL-CALL 



AND 



OTHER POEMS. 



BY 

GEORGE JOHNSON. 



// 



PHILADELPHIA: 

J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO. 
1876. 

r 



ciStl'- 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1875, by 

J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., 
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 



PREFACE. 



It was the intention of my dear husband to have 
published a little volume of poems appropriate in gen- 
eral to the Centennial, but he being called to the 
Higher Life before its completion, I have endeavored 
so far as practicable to carry out his plan concerning 
it. A number of poems intended especially for this 
work not having been completed, I have thought best 
to introduce some of his earlier productions, which I 
trust will prove acceptable. Hoping the public will be 
lenient to all errors they may discover, I venture to 
send it forth. 

M. S. J. 

Bucks Co., Pa.', October, 1875. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

The Roll-Call of the Old Thirteen 9 

Ode. For July 4th, 1876 16 

America to England on the Occasion of the Centennial, 1876 20 
1776. Independence Hall. 1876. An Ode for the Centen- 
nial ........... 23 

Song. Written for the Occasion of the Celebration of the 
One Hundredth Anniversary of the Boston Tea-Party . 28 

The Voices of the Clocks -30 

At Washington's Crossing ....... 39 

Song : The Old-Fashioned Fireplace . . . . • 41 

Song of the City ......... 44 

Song of the Telegraph . .' . . . . .46 

The Slave Auction-Bell ....... 48 

The Centenarian . . . . . . . . -51 

The Story of the Pine 57 

Sixty-Eight and Sixty-Nine ....... 63 

The Cheerful Slave 68 

Perplexed .......... 70 

Gentle Rain 72 

Faces at the Window . '74 

To-Day .......... 77 

I* s 



6 ■ CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

John Greenleaf Whiltier ....... 78 

Still Young ......... 79 

To One Departed ........ 82 

The Grass 83 

Harvest-Time . . . . . . . . .87 

Summer Hymn ......... 89 

Tohickon . .92 

A Day in October ........ 96 

Indian Summer ......... 98 

The Frost .......... 99 

The Ice-King ......... 102 

The Winter Night and the Summer Noon .... 106 

The Stream of the Valley . . . . . . . 108 

The Land of Nevermore . . . . . . .110 

The Mystery . , . . . . . . -US 

Is the World Old or Young ? 1 16 

At the Metropolis 118 

Onw^ard ! .......... 120 

The Wave . . . . . . . . . .122 

Life through Death . . . . . . . .125 

Lines on a Skull . . . . . . . .127 

The Blue Coat and the Gray. A Ballad of the Rebellion . 129 
The Promise . . . . . . , . -133 

The Victory Month — July, 1863 140 

My Country . . . ' . . . . , . 144 

The Virginia Homestead ....... 146 

Break the News Gently 150 

Their Graves ......... 152 

Slavery . . . . , . , . . .154 

Lincoln Monument . . . . . . . .156 



CONTENTS. ^ 

PAGE 

After the War jc; 

Contrasts •••...... 162 

The Nameless Grave . . . . . . . i6ii 

The Old Mill 167 

Only a Little While i-q 

Work ,72 

A Rhyme of Cheer i-^ 

The World and I 174 

" Home and Abroad" 175 

Flowers of Palestine i^g 

Down by the Mill i-o 

The Ruined Home , . . . . . , .180 

The Lost Ship ......... ig-z 

Silenced jg5 

" Bury me in the Sunshine" 187 

Tears 189 

The Weeping Child joi 

The Summer-Time is Over iq-> 

Faith and Love ..... 



194 

The Angel of Sunset iqc 

Never Again . . . 1^6 

Rest-Song ......... . 107 



THE ROLL-CALL OF THE OLD 
THIRTEEN. 

I. 
A VOICE from a mountain height, 
As sweet as an air in June, 
As solemn as the sea, — 
A voice not in the night, 

But the near and naked noon. 
What shall the answer be ? 
Listen and look and lean, 
Tremble and be afraid. 
Answer, Old Thirteen ! 

For to you the call is made. 

II. 
Massachusetts : 
I hear the voice and I know ; 
Liberty, can it be said 

I was faithless to thee and to law? 
I am here as I was long ago. 
Here with my living and dead. 
Not with an oath and its awe 

2 9 



THE ROLL-CALL OF 

Would I say I did my best 

In the service of freedom and truth ; 
But look at the scars on my breast 

And the hope in the hearts of my youth ! 

III. 

New Hampshire : 

Show me thy glorious face^ 

Goddess that callest to me. 

Sweet spirit 1 let me be cheered — 
But no, — in the freedom-blessed race 

Whose homes on my granite are reared, 

Thy features reflected I see. 
'' Here !" is my answer for them 

When Right for their service shall call ; 
The flood of the fight they would stem 

Till slaughter had swallowed them all. 

IV. 

Connecticut : 

Here, with the flag of thy stars. 

The red and the white and the blue. 

Held in my hand and my heart, 
Stricken with shot through and through. 

To shield it I did my part 



THE OLD THIRTEEN. n 

When thunder and battle-blast 

Swept round it like prairie flame ; 
But what is past is past, — 

The glory is more than the shame. 

V. 

Rhode Island : 

They smile at me since I am least, 

But the burden I share with the whole. 
If I honor the work that I do 
Am I worthy to sit at the feast 

With the rich and the great, — since the true 

Stature of man is the soul ? 
I heard the wail and the call 

Of the perishing land in her woes ; 
I gave her my little, my all ; 

Perhaps 'twas that saved her, — who knows? 

VI. 

New York: 

If empire chiefly I sought. 
Prosperity, honors, and ease, 
Surely it cannot be said 
After the years I have wrought, 
I languish for lack of these. 

Or for promise of power ahead. 



12 THE ROLL-CALL OF 

Loyal and loving I stand ; 

And were I queen of the earth, 
What, I would ask, is a land 

Without order and liberty worth? 

VII. 

Pennsylvania : 

As after the storm-cloud's march. 

Broad in the beamy blue, 
Iris spans valley and hill. 
So shines the ocean-shored arch. 

Built in the world's wide view. 
And I am its keystone still. 
Green are my heart and my hills. 

And as fresh as the water that runs 
In the mossy pipes of my rills 

Are the fervor and faith of my sons. 

VIII. 

New Jersey: 

Still on my soil are the stains 
That were left by patriots' feet. 
Sore after battle and rout ; 
Not all the century's rains. 

Not all the snows that have beat. 
Have washed them entirely out. 



THE OLD THIRTEEN. 

Elsewhere 'neath battle-trod earth 
Count I the graves of my lost. 

Know I not liberty's worth, 
Purchased at such a cost ? 

IX. 

Maryland : 

Blandished and tempted and torn, 

Caught in the whirlwind of war. 

In the mazes of dreams that were lies, 
A light that was not of the morn 

Flashed from a perilous shore. 

Blazed on and blinded mine eyes. 
Like a star on heaven's blue brink, 

I was ready to chaos to fall ; 
I wavered, but did not sink, — 

Thank God ! I can answer the call. 



Delaware : 

With the terrible tread of War 
The continent shaking I heard, 
In the shadow of thunder I lay 
Watching the fight from afar. 
At last a song like a bird ! 
At last a light like a star ! 



13 



14 



THE ROLL-CALL OF 

Then I opened my eyes on the war ; 

The red lightnings paused in their play, 
And brighter than ever before 

Shone the promise of permanent day. 

XI. 

Virginia : 

I stand not where once I stood. 

Scathe me in annal and verse, 
Tell my whole story of shame : 
Say that I bargained in blood, 

Was kind to a palpable curse, — 
Where is my once white name? 
But something comes up with the tide. 

Wide blown as the breaths of the sea, — 
A newer and better pride 

That hints of a glory to be. 

XII. 

North Carolina : 

Goddess, what have I to show 
As harvest of rich years of time ? 
Here liberty early abode ; 
I promised thee fair long ago. 

But I shared in the popular crime. 
And later I reaped as I sowed. 



THE OLD THIRTEEN. 

But give me a place in the line, 
The years of the future are long ; 

I will walk in the light of the sign, — 
Of the sign of the sinking of wrong. 

XIII. 

South Carolina: 

Vanquished, but guilty no less, 

Bowing my heart and my head, 
Here am I, ashamed in the light ; 
Saved from disastrous success, 

Ghosts of armies of dead 

Haunt me by day and by night. 
And yet what I did I did; 

As ye will interpret my tears. 
Can the shame of a crime be hid 

After a thousand years ? 

XIV. 

Georgia : 

Am I last to answer, the call ? 
Here, by my sister's side, 

I ask, is there pardon for me ? 
Had we compassed the Union's fall 

'Twere well with my dead to have died, 
Or that I were sunk in the sea. 



15 



1 6 ODE. 

But the tempest of battle is o'er, 
The sky shows its blue serene, 

And we count in the heavens once more 
The stars of the Old Thirteen ! 



ODE. 

FOR JULY 4TH, 1876. 
I. 

It comes ! the expected day, 
Blissful in every ray. 

Put all annoy 
And selfish care away. 
The summer land lies fair, 
Nature with us doth share 

The general joy. 



A hundred years have gone 
Since freedom's cloudy dawn 

Burst into day ; 
Its sun is rolling on 
Through free, rejoicing skies, 
And in our joy we rise 

As free as they ! 



ODE. 



III. 



17 



Cities and peaceful farms ! 
Th' occasion's sweet alarms 

Your rest shall break ; 
'Tis no wild call to arms; 
To hail with patriot pride 
This glad centennial tide, 

Awake ! awake ! 

IV. 

Ye mountains, stand and be 
Types of the liberty 

That now is ours ; 
As firmly stand may we. 
Ye prairies, glad and green, 
Toss in your varied sheen, 

Like seas of flowers ! 



Rejoice, ye conscious trees ! 
Concordant with the breeze. 

Your branches wide 
Wave in its airy seas. 
Old Ocean, roll and roar 
The green length of your shore 

In solemn pride. 



i8 



ODE. 



VI. 



Rivers! rejoicing run, 
Like silver in the sun. 

Ye sea-like deeps ! 
The anthem is begun ; 
A murmur like the main 
Add to the growing strain 

That o'er you sweeps ! 



VII 



The banners, bright as bloom,— 
The thunder, boom on boom,— 

The festal fires 
That shall the street illume. 
Blazing as if they knew 
Their glare prolongs the view. 

As day expires, — 



VIII. 



The steeple's lifted bell, — 
Music's exultant swell, — 

The clang and call,— 
The people's joy these tell; 
But note not it alone, — 
A solemn undertone 

Runs through it all. 



ODE. 19 



IX. 



They feel — they deeply feel 
Their country's woe and weal 

Dates fresh to-day, 
As reverently they kneel 
To take the mighty trust 
Which Thou, Great Sovereign, dost 

Upon them lay. 

X. 

God of the nations. Thou 
To whom all earth doth bow. 

Where shall we stand 
A hundred years from now? 
A thousand ? — Old as Rome, 
Will Free(^om still her home 

Have in our land ? 

XI. 

Teach us, teach us to be 
As worthy to be free 

As were our sires ; 
Then shall the future see. 
Burning on all our heights. 
Freedom's unlessened lights 

And virginal fires ! 



AMERICA TO ENGLAND. 



AMERICA TO ENGLAND ON THE 
OCCASION OF THE CENTENNIAL, 
1876. 

Welcome to thee, our mother-guest ! 

The child advanced to manhood's claim. 
Though parted from the parent breast 

Knows whence it came. 

The tie of blood is close and strong, 
We cannot break it if we would. 

Kin knoweth kin, though oft and long 
Misunderstood. 

We once were foes, but better days 
Dawn o'er the darkness and the ill. 

We loved thee once ; and, to our praise, 
We love thee still. 

Dear mother-country ! yes, oh, yes. 
It is thy child- that to thee speaks, 

A good will striving to express. 
Like that it seeks. 



AMERICA TO ENGLAND. 21 

Though 'tween us, stormy, dark, and wide. 

The waters of an ocean run, 
Who shall our histories divide? 

The two are one ! 

Our English tongue, — it is a sign 

That shows how close we are to thee. 

Our rise was thine, our progress thine. 
Our fall would be. 

We share thy glory and thy shame, 
All thou hast lost, all thou hast won ; 

With knightly Sidney's twine the name 
Of Washington. 

So through the long illustrious list 

Of names wide given to renown. 
Laurels with laurels intertwist 

From Chaucer down. 

Great Shakspeare's fame and Runnymede, — 
We think of these as half our own, — 

And Cromwell, whose red, daring deed 
Smote king and throne. 

Art thou unwilling we should claim 

So large a portion of thy past ? 
If then thy own, our final fame 

Grows even more vast. 
3 



22 AMERICA TO ENGLAND. 

Time will remember whence we bring 
The strength that gathers like a sea, 

And proudly will its parent spring 
Be traced to thee. 

Freedom and love of freedom — both 
Came to us from thine own estate. 

And now our hundred years of growth 
We celebrate. 

An honored guest, behold the land 
Nature and God so amply bless, 

The elements of empire grand 
That we possess. 

Our institutions, systems, aims, 
All that we are or hope to be. 

To worth their weak or powerful claims 
Come close to see. 

Behold us ! and with kindly eyes. 

Forgiving faults thou canst but mark ; 

Too long our mutualsympathies 
Have lain in dark. 

That we have passed the unjust sneer 
Upon each other each will own ; 

Bold censure, glad to be severe. 
We both have known. 



1776. INDEPENDENCE HALL. 1876. 23 

The critic's is a dangerous art, 

And when it prides itself to pain 
And raise a rancor in the heart, 

Whose is the gain ? 

Nations — great nations, too — may be 

As petty as the private mind. 
To hate and groundless jealousy 

Meanly inclined. 

Our lower instincts scorning then. 

As Christian nations let us act, 
Till ''Peace on earth, good will to men" 

Become a fact. 



1776. INDEPENDENCE HALL. 1876. 

AN ODE FOR THE CENTENNIAL. 
I. 

Old Hall, we give thee greeting 

From continent and isle ; 
The centuries are meeting 
Above thine honored pile. 
Broad to the skies 
Our glad land lies. 
Basking in Freedom's smile. 



24 1776. INDEPENDENCE HALL. 1876. 

ir. 

What memories throng upon us, 

Richer than Runnymede ! 
A hundred years have shown us 
The value of the seed 
Our fathers sowed 
In tears and blood, — 
Ay, Time approves the deed. 

III. 

That glorious Declaration, 

Old Hall, from thee went forth ; 
Within thy walls the nation 
Had its triumphant birth. 
No place to fame 
Has greater claim. 
Thou classic spot of earth ! 

IV. 

Long, long within the steeple 

The bell had silent hung ; 
Below, the waiting people 
Listened to hear its tongue. 
Hark ! ne'er before 
On any shore 
So glad a peal was rung ! 



1776. INDEPENDENCE HALL, 1876. 25 

V. 

The summer-vault of heaven 

Could not contain the sound, 
The continents were riven 
To their remotest bound. 
'Twas not alone 
The Bell's glad tone, — 
God's voice was in the sound ! 

VI. 

Dead as the dust of Edom 

Old nations long had lain ; 
That mighty peal of freedom 
Roused them to life again. 
From living graves, 
No longer slaves, 
They rose once more to reign ! 

VII. 

''Men are created equal;" 

'Twas a simple thing to say, 
But a dark and bloody sequel 
Was dated from that day, 
When infant right 
And giant might 
Engaged in desperate fray. 
3* 



26 1776. INDEPENDENCE HALL. 1876. 

VIII. 

The end was greater glory 

Than the sword has often won. 
We know the starry story 

Of what was dared and done ; 
And thou, old Hall, 
Dost best recall 
The dawn of Freedom's sun. 

IX. 

Those beams of blessing on us 

A hundred years have shone ; 
The rights our fathers won us, 
Secure, are still our own. 
My land ! arise 
And recognize 
The favors thou hast known ! 

X. 

Grateful and glad thy voicing 
By every hearth should fall ; 
But centre thy rejoicing 
Around the grand old Hall. 
Welcome them here 
From far and near. 
The friendly nations all. 



1776. INDEPENDENCE HALL. 1876. 27 

XI. 

Fling out the flag and pennon, 

The festal scene to grace ; 

Let the unshotted cannon 

Thunder its solemn bass, 

While band and bell 

The rapture swell. 

And joy lights every face. 

XII. 

Let Industry, displaying 

Her varied triumphs, stand 
Crowned in our midst, surveying 
Her good work in the land, — 
Her rich increase, 
While Power and Peace 
Attend her, hand in hand. 

XIII. 

Glad sight ! Old Hall, repeated 

May it for ages be. 
Unless, of Freedom cheated. 
We fall, perhaps ere thee. 

No, no ; our land ^ 

Still strong must stand. 
An Empire of the Free ! 



28 THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY. 

XIV. 

Yet Freedom's favor waneth 

Where greed takes foremost place ; 
As sovereign she reigneth 
With an exacting grace; 
She will not stay 
Where men decay, 
But loves a virtuous race. 



SONG. 

WRITTEN FOR THE OCCASION OF THE CELEBRATION OF 
THE ONE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BOSTON 
TEA-PARTY. 

Said royal George, '' My subjects thrive, 

My subjects o'er the sea; 
Cannot my ministers contrive 

Their thrift shall prosper me ? 
Few men drink wine, but all drink tea, — 

A tax on it I'll lay; 
For our good use none will refuse 

So small a sum to pay." 
And soon in fact the royal act 

Was sent across the sea ; 
So, Betty, fill the kettle up. 

We'll all take tea. 



THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY. 29 

But, sooth to say, the king's desire 

Did not approval find ; 
His free-born subjects rose in ire 

And plainly spoke their mind : 
"■ If prince or peer tax what we drink 

And never ask our leave. 
Then what we eat, we can but think. 

Will next their care receive." 
Cold and black shall hang the rack, 

The urn shall empty be ; 
So, Betty, take the kettle off, 

We won't drink tea. 

All royal England could not stir 

The people from their way ; 
Tea-parties grew unpopular, 

Save one — in Boston Bay ! 
Oh, matchless men were those of yore ! 

As chainless as the sea, 
And every cup to-night we pour 

Shall in their honor be. 
The tyrant's yoke for us they broke, — 

The cup we drink is free ; 
So, Betty, fill the kettle up. 

We'll all drink tea. 



30 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 



From parlor and hall 

I heard the clocks call, — 

The new and the old. 
The hour, lone and late, 
By both was just told. 
Within was soft light 
From the low-burning grate ; 
Outside was the night 
And the iron-like cold. 

II. 

No star dared to wink ; 
No sound save the clink 
Now and then of a coal; 
No footstep, nor stir ; 
The house held its breath, 

And over me stole 
A sense as of death, — 
Of a presence to which 
All life did defer, 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

And whose shadow o'ercast 

My soul with a pall, 
As if I and the vast 

Lonely darkness were all. 

III. 

Then the clocks each to each, 
In unusual speech, 

Called through the dim air. 
With a stern, stately stroke 
The old clock first spoke 

From its niche on the stair. 

I pictured it there. 
Like a monk cloaked and tall, ' 

With its great, grave face 

And the coffin-like case. 
Standing straight 'gainst the wall. 

''Alas! alas!" it said, 
''The best of life has fled, 
The dear old days are dead. 

And come no more. 
Mournful I keep my trust, 
The bloom has died to dust, 
The red has changed to rust. 

So bright before. 



31 



32 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

^'Time's weary sentinel, 
Long have I stood to tell 
The household 'All is well/ 

With Time at least. 
Often my mournful stroke 
The funeral silence broke ; 
Again it gladly spoke 

The wedding feast. 

''But in this mansion proud, 
• My tick once clear and loud, 
(How fast the moments crowd 
It to the worst !) 
• After so many years 

Sounds like the fall of tears, — 
Alas ! where are the ears 
That heard it first ? 

"Oh, generations dead ! 
Oh, forms and faces fled ! 
How full has death been fed 

On your decay ! 
And what remaineth now? 
The silence and the snow, — 
But tell me, who art thou 

That seem'st so gay?" 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

A chime rang silvery low. 
Above the marbly glow 
(Like rose-light upon snow) 

A face was seen. 
The ormolu shone bright, 
The costly malachite 
Flashed back a mingled light 

Of gold and green. 

The bronze deer stood in grace 
A-top the ebony case ; 
An almost human face 

Beamed tranquil there, 
By marble darkness bound. 
Again that silvery sound 
Plashed in the lake-like round 

Of the still air. 

It said : '^ How sad thy tone. 
Old friend, that there alone 
Dost stand and make thy moan ! 

My tuneful tongue 
Shall cheer this sombre room ; 
This firelight shines like bloom; 
I do not feel the gloom." 

" No ; thou art young." 
4 



33 



34 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

''Dark lies the frost-locked ground, 
But through 'the blue profound 
The sun doth keep his round ; 

His golden keys 
Shall ope the earth again 
To the renewing' rain, 
Why, then, dost thou complain 

Of hours like these?" 

''■'Tis not," the sad voice said, 
''Because the spring is dead. 
And summer's sweetness fled, 

I sorrow so ; 
Nature I still can trust ; 
The dead rose from the dust 
Will rise again, and must, 

When June airs blow. 

" But there are sadder things 
Than wasting winter brings, — 
A chill that deeper stings 

Than white-fanged frost. 
Sweet rains from warm clouds poured 
Shall green again the sward. 
But when shall be restored 

What Love has lost ? 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

" For me this very night 
A century ends its flight, 
And thoughts come like a blight 

My spirit o'er; 
For, thinking of the past, 
I see, as if forecast, 
The future, vague and vast, 

Gloom up before." 

''The future !" raptly cried 
The young voice at my side ; 
''/hail its coming tide, 

Its rising roar. 
Clouds it will bring-, I know, 
But, like their billowy flow 
In spring, when south winds blow, 

How rich its store ! 

"Above its shadowy drift 
The peaks of promise lift, 
With here a rosy rift 

And there a blue." ' 
The voice spoke from the stair : 
" Oh, thou dost paint it fair. 
But long it cannot wear 

Such heavenly hue." 



35 



36 THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

The other, in reply, 

Said : " Must I, then, deny 

The beauty I descry ? 

Must I, like thee, 
Forego the prospect fair ? 
Shape the delicious air 
To tempest-beatings, where 

Mad ruin shall be?" 

The answer was : " No, no ; 
Thou need'st not think it so. 
I only sought to show 

The temperate truth. 
This earthly life of ours 
Is not made up of flowers, 
Of sunny scenes and hours, 

Of warmth and youth. 

''At first so fair it seems. 

The young heart dreams and dreams, 

But wakes to find the beams 

It loved withdrawn. 
Blight falleth on the bloom, 
The air, once all perfume. 
Grows thick with thunderous gloom, 

And age steals on." 



THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

Then said, in saddened tone, 
The other : " Thou hast grown 
Old at the post, and known 

All this to be. 
If all our hopes are lies, 
If evening her tired eyes 
Must always close with sighs 

On misery; 

"Surely it then were best 
For all things to have rest. 
Close sunken on earth's breast, 

No more to rise. 
Why should the roses bloom. 
If but across the tomb 
To waft their lost perfume 

'Neath mocking skies ?'^ 

'' Forgive my mournful mood. 
More lightly than I should," 
The old clock said, ''the good 

Of life I scan. 
Let me destroy no cheer, 
But ever hold more dear 
The spirit needed here 

So much by man : 
4* 



37 



38 THE VOICES OF THE CLOCKS. 

''A patient heart to wait, 

Ready for any fate, 

With gladness not too great, 

Nor too subdued. 
Doing life's earnest work, 
Too brave to pause or shirk, 
Whether the skies be murk 

Or rosy-hued." 



Then merrily through the listening air, 
From the mantel and the stair, 

Called the clocks together. 
The gaining day leaned toward the light. 
Faint star-points pierced the pall of night. 
The inside cheer soon put to flight 

The thoughts of winter weather. 

II. 

Half dreaming that I had not dreamed. 
So real had the voices seemed, 

I rose and crossed the hall-way. 
Each pendulum-pulse in concord beat, 
Sad age had felt youth's influence sweet. 
And cooled in turn the latter's heat ; 

And so it should be alway. 

December 15, 1874. 



AT WASHINGTON'S CROSSING. 



AT WASHINGTON'S CROSSING. 

O^ER the river brightly flowing, 
O'er the green-shored Delaware, 

And the landscape golden -glowing. 
Swept the warm, wide waves of air. 

'Twas the teeming time of summer; 

All the land was full of cheer. 
Wind and stream in mingled murmur 

Poured their cool sound on my ear. 

By an old oak shut and shaded 

From the vast exterior day, 
All the present from me faded 

As upon that shore I lay. 

'Twas a classic shore, for yonder, 
Just across the bright blue tide, 

Where the heavy train in thunder 
Rushes by the valley's side. 

Once a little patriot army 

Pressed with painful, eager tramp, 

Through the freezing night and stormy 
Toward the sleeping Hessian camp. 



39 



40 



AT WASHINGTON'S CROSSING. 

Aye, a scene rose up before me, 

Darkly changed from this of light, - 

Not the summer noon was o'er me, 
But the frigid winter night. 

To essay the perilous crossing 
Gathered here that hero band. 

'Mid the ice their frail boats, tossing, 
Struggle for the hostile land. 

Oh, the toil, the cold, the danger ! 

Freemen, do you think of these? 
Do you e'er in fancy change your 

Homes of peace and beds of ease 

For the dark and frowning river? 

For the sore march and the fray ? 
For the cold whose icy quiver 

Cuts the glow of life away? 

The remembrance fondly cherish 
Of the men none could enslave, 

For a nation can but perish 

That forgets its good and brave. 



THE OLD-FASHIONED FIREPLACE. 



SONG: THE OLD-FASHIONED FIRE 
PLACE. 



The old, old-fashioned fireplace ! 

" Ah ! it has had its day, 

And the old, old-fashioned dwellers, 

They, too, have passed away. 
No more the wood-fire flashes 

The country hearth upon, — 
Ashes, ashes, ashes ! 

The past is dead and gone. 
But something of its mettle 

Is welded with our lives ; 
And the singing of the kettle 

Its memory revives. 



We see the homely grouping 
Around the settler's hearth : 

The grandsire gray and stooping, 
And almost done with earth ; 

The grandma at her knitting. 
The children strong and tall. 



42 THE OLD-FASHIONED FIREPLACE. 

And flitting, flitting, flitting 
Against the chimney-wall, 

The glow that lights their faces, — 
The pure, fresh, living flame, — 

Oh ! it was from such places' 
The strength of freedom came ! 

III. 

The old, old-fashioned fireplace ! 

We have no need to-day 
To build its wide volcanic top 

To give our hearth-fires play. 
But we have need still longer 

Our sires to emulate, 
Stronger, stronger, stronger 

To build both home and state. 
With all that we inherit, 

That the fruitful present bears, 
Say, can we show a sjoirit 

That can fully match with theirs? 

IV. 

The old, old-fashioned fireplace ! 

It was a roaring sight 
To see the sparks like fire-flies 

Shoot upward through the night. 



THE OLD-FASHIONED FIREPLACE. 

If Winter, the old stormer, 

Raised-a louder din, 
Warmer, warmer, warmer 

Glowed the hearts within. 
Young hope and faith and fervor ! 

Oh ! these lift up a land, 
And well her sons will serve her 

If these she can command. 

V. 

The old, old-fashioned fireplace ! 

We seem to feel its blaze 
Burn through the vanished winters 

And light our later days. 
Oh, cheeks so bright and blushing ! 

Your bloom has done away ; 
But we feel your warm blood rushing 

Along our veins to-day. 
The grateful heart remembers 

What idle hearts forget ; 
We feel the glorious embers 

Of the past are living yet. 



43 



44 



SONG OF THE CITY. 



SONG OF THE CITY. ■ 

Oh, the heart with its merciless beat ! 

And its rivers of red that run ! 
Oh, the brain with its haste and heat ! 

I am heart and brain in one. 
As the waves of mind's mystical sea 

Flow ever from pole to pole, 
So the currents of life in me, 

For I am its centre and soul. 

When earth for the first was green 

In the eyes of the children of men. 
They gave me the title of Queen, 

And mine it has been since then. 
Mine, with {qw to divide 

The honors of empire with me, 
For my rule as the earth is as wide, 

My strength as the strength of the sea. 

The tramp of the train on the shore. 
The tremble and trill of the wire, 

The pant of the piston, the roar 
Of furnace and forge all a-fire, 



SONG OF THE CITY. 

The smoke-drift afloat on the air, 
The shimmer of sails on the sea, — 

What are they but signs that declare 
The world is still toiling for me? 

The mountains with riches are stored. 

The soil with its harvests, — for me 
Their tribute and treasure are poured, 

As rivers are poured to the sea. 
In my close and passionate life 

I dream, and I dream of peace, 
Yet I grow more in love with a strife 

That I know can never cease. 

The sounds of my splendid unrest 

They woo with a magical power. 
And I gather the brightest and best 

Around me to flourish and flower, — 
And to fall, you may say. Ah ! yes ; 

Alas for the souls that go down. 
The brave and the brilliant no less 

Than the thousands unaskino: renown ! 



45 



46 SONG OF THE TELEGRAPH. 



SONG OF THE TELEGRAPH. 

Men praised in the long ago 
That fiery courser, the Sun ; 

Now his golden car is slow 
And Time itself outrun. 

For the live electric fire, 

Behold ! is tamed and taught ; 

On my trilling tracks of wire 

It flies with the speed of thought. 

Steam is a panting hack. 
Toiling with fettered heels ; 

I flit to his goal and back 

In a single roll of his wheels. 

Farewell to the lagging breeze ! 

In the calms of night it drops, 
While, flashing under the seas 

And over the mountain-tops. 

My starry words I- wing 

Along the nerve-like wire* 
That thrills like a conscious thing 

To my flying touch of fire. 



SONG OF THE TELEGRAPH. 

Zone unto zone I bind, 

Tropic to polar shore ; 
And the nations shout to find 

That distance is no more. 

From me the soul a hint 

Receives of its future powers, 

As the dawning' s sanguine glint 
Foretells noon's riper hours. 

I am the wildest dream 

That ever to fact was wrought ; 
In me a closer gleam 

Of the infinite is caught. 

My glory and renown 

An age triumphant sings, — 

I am the star and crown 
Of brain-created things. 

Yet not the lowly grass 

Nor the humbler dust I scorn, 
For I know the mighty mass 

Of the universe* was born 

Each part with an equal claim 
To the thoughtful mind's regard : 



47 



48 THE SLAVE AUCTION-BELL. 

No more my subtle flame 

Than the rock so dull and hard. 

There is a mystic tie 

That doth all things unite : 

The soul that cannot die 

With those of sense and sight. 

The skies that o'er earth span 
Are kin to her own green sod. 

There's divinity in man 
And humanity in God ! 



THE SLAVE AU CTI O N -B E L L. 

(In the town of Beaufort, North Carolina, a large bell that before 
the war was used to call buyers to slave auctions was afterwards hung 
in a building occupied by a colored school, and employed to call the 
children to their studies.) 

In the town the bell was hung, 

And it rung 
From its iron lips, year by year, 
Not a peaceful call to prayer 

On the air, 
For the worshipful to hear ; 



THE SLAVE AUCTION-BELL. 49 

Not a clamorous peal of war, 
Telling that to waste their shore 

Came some foeman bold, 
But a call that terror gave 
Only to the shackled slave, 

Waiting to be sold. 

To the poor slave-mother's breast 

Closer pressed 
Was her trembling child in fear, 
As that bell with heavy stroke 

Harshly spoke 
That the parting hour was near. 
Lowly bosoms heaved with sighs. 
Eyes looked sadly into eyes 

Nevermore to meet again, 
As that sad somid, ringing high, 
Wronged the free, rejoicing sky, 
And the people came to buy — 

Buy their fellow-men ! 

Error cannot always last ; 

Battle-blast 
Swept the hoary curse away. 
There's a gladder t^le to tell,— 

Hear the bell 
As it rings and swings to-day : 
5* 



5° 



THE SLAVE AUCTION-BELL. 

"Ye, who once like beasts were bought, 
Come as freemen to be taught. 
From your long, dark ignorance 
In the blessed light advance 

Of the school. 
Right has triumphed. Right is strong, 
And the iron hand of Wrong 

Cannot rule." 

Thus with fine poetic force 

Does the course 
Of great evil sometimes end. 
Sometimes from the very stones 
Freedom's sweet-awakened tones 

Do ascend. 
Masters ! tyrants ! mark it well, — 

In some hour 
Voices wherewith you proclaim 
Your defenseless fellows' shame. 
May in turn pronounce the knell 

Of your power ! 



THE CENTENARIAN. 



THE CENTENARIAN. 

He sits by his Northern hearth to-day, 

Far from the noise of the red frontiers ; 
An old, old man whose few locks are gray 

With the frosts of a hundred years. 
His aged face is wrinkled and wan, 

And the blood in his veins is thin and cold, 
But his soul is that of the strong, brave man. 

And his heart is not yet old. 

Ere the land that we now bless as our own 

Took its place 'mid the nations of earth, 
And our beautiful flag to the wind was thrown, 

He had his wildwood birth. 
From the humble door of the pioneer 

He first looked up to the smiling sun. 
And the first loud sound that fell on his ear 

Was the crack of the hunter's gun. 

Oh ! a ruder cradle you seldom will see 

Than that which was rocked by the settler's fire, 

And never a bolder lad than he, — 
The son of the settler sire ! 



52 THE CENTENARIAN. 

His hair was like night, his cheek like morn, 
His form like his father's, straight and tall. 

And his voice as mellow as that of the horn 
Sounding the hunter's call. 

To him oft, when the blast howled through the trees 

And the chimney wall was ruddy with flame, 
Had the tale been told, how over the seas 

The Pilgrim Fathers came. 
And many another tale he had learned 

Of what men for freedom's sweet sake will do. 
Till deep in his bosom's core there burned 

A hate for the tyrant crew. 

*' Oh, pa !" asked the boy once when he had mused 

O'er a story of people who filled bondmen's graves, 
*' Do you think like them we'll ever be used, — 

Oh, pa ! will we ever be slaves ? 
You say that our rulers grow crueler each day 

And will not be warned; will they crush us?" he said. 
''Ah, boy !" spoke the sire as he put him away, 

"I fear there are storms ahead." 

And soon did the tempest-cloud blacken the air. 
And wider and fiercer it swept on its path ; 

The people had borne all that freemen could bear, 
And now they arose in their wrath. 



THE CENTENARIAN. 53 

They spurned and they trampled the English laws, 

And felt it a better and nobler thing 
To fight and to fall in Liberty's cause 

Than cringe to the English king. 

And the young lad heard the proud news told 

Of Lexington's long-remembered fray, 
Ere the blood of the slain was scarce yet cold 

And the deed but yesterday. 
Then wilder the tap of the rallying drum 

Rolled over the arming, desperate land, 
And he saw in hot haste from the furrow come 

Brave Putnam and his band. 

They called to his father as by him they spurred, 

Who turned from the Avork he had just begun — 
His soul all on fire with the tidings he heard — 

And went to the house for his gun. 
Then the boy smothered down his few faint fears, 

And eagerly asked \i he might go 
Along with the rest of the volunteers 

And fight the British foe. 

But the father only proudly smiled 

As he gazed in those eyes so clearly blue. 

Kissed warmer the lips of his wife and child. 
And bade them both adieu ; 



54 



THE CENTENARIAN. 

Then northward marched to share the renown 

Of Ticonderoga's deed of fame, 
Where the flag of the British fort came down 

'*In the great Jehovah's name !" 

In a score of fights he took full part 

As those terrible years of strife wore on, 
Then a bullet was sent to the patriot's heart, 

And the patriot's life was gone. 
Then the boy, who was now a strong youth grown. 

Wiped the tear-drops hot from his mother's face. 
Took the dead one's rifle and cloak as his own, 

And stood in the father's place. 

At Yorktown he toiled in the grim redoubt. 

Where the shot and the shell in fury poured. 
Till he saw O'Hara march humbly out 

And give up his chieftain's sword. 
Then the stars of peace, with a holy flush. 

To the thunder-filled sky the soldier saw come, 
And the foe, from the men they could not crush. 

Slunk back to their island home. 

Oh, then was the long, long woe repaid ! 

The oppressor's might could not prevail; 
The right and the wrong God's hand had weighed. 

And the right had turned the scale ! 



THE CENTENARIAN. 55 

Oh ! grandly the breast of the youth would heave 
As he thought of that glorious victory-hour, 

And trod the soil he had helped retrieve 
From the haughty despot's power ! 

The years rolled on, till across the main 

The host of the Briton came once more. 
When he shouldered his musket and hurried again 

To strike for his native shore. 
On Niagara's field and at Chippewa 

He saw the lines of the red-coats break, 
And with Macomb gallantly fought one day 

At Plattsburg by the lake. 

The enemy, humbled on plain and tide. 

Their sails soon set to the western breeze. 
And, broken once more in their strength and pride, 

Sped over the distant seas. 
The years rolled on, and star after star 

Blazed out on our banner's azure hue. 
Till the State that was born 'mid the thunders of war 

To a mighty nation grew. 

Still the old man lived, though one by one 
His comrades, hoary and honored and blessed, 

Drew their hands away from their labors done, 
And went to their happy rest. 



56 THE CENTENARIAN. 

Still the old man lived ; till the traitor's blade 
Struck deep at the nation's honor and life, 

And the armies of treason against us arrayed 
Rushed on to the dreadful strife. 

And now, as he thinks of these stormy days, 

A shade, as of doubt, oft crosses his brow ; 
But he smiles it away, and often says 

'Tis grand to be living now. 
He mourns for the dear lives daily lost, 

For the desolate homes and the bitter woe, 
But he feels that the prize is worth the cost. 

Fearful it be although. 

As sure as the sunshine follows the rain. 

And stars shine out from their depths of blue, 
He says that our country will stand strong again 

If we are watchful and true. 
And he often prays, if it only might be 

That the lamp of his life may not go out 
Till Peace has smiled on us, and he lived to see 

The end of this trouble and doubt. 

November, 1864. 



THE STORY OF THE PINE. 57 



THE STORY OF THE PINE. 

The fairest of the forest forms, 

The loftiest of its line, 
The loudest of the winter's storms, 

Thus spoke the ancient Pine : 

" When first I reared my infant head 

Cannot with truth be told, 
But often have I heard it said 

I am a century old. 

*' And surely since upon the beach 

I broke the emerald moss, 
The changes I have seen would reach 

A hundred years across. 

*' Never the lightning-stroke has rent 
My boughs nor scorched my grain ; 

And kindly Heaven has always sent 
The dew and vital rain. 

''Oh, oft with joy have I the fierce 
And flashing tempest met, 
6 



58 THE STORY OF THE PINE. 

Or felt my strong roots slowly pierce 
The dark earth deeper yet. 

"For does all conscious joy belong 

To human forms alone ? 
Have I not senses fine and strong, 

Perhaps, as are your own ? 

*'Am I a dull, unknowing thing, 
When 'neath the uncovered sky 

I feel the tingling tides of spring 
Within me mounting high? 

''Or when my branches, shower-wet. 

The sudden sunlight strikes. 
Or when the winter rain has set 

Them thick with silver spikes? 

'' Oh, I have loved the lonely wild; 

There all was fresh and free, 
The birds that sang, the flowers that smiled. 

Though I was but a tree. 

" When many a day had passed away. 

One morn a settler came. 
And cruelly felled my brother trees, 

But left me still the same. 



THE STORY OF THE PINE. 

" Within my green protecting shade, 
With sweet, wild water nigh, 

His humble home of logs he made, 
O'er which I towered high. 

''And when with weary limbs at e'en 
He sought his welcome bed, 

A king had seldom slept, I ween, 
With loftier roof o'erhead. 

''I watched him at his cheerful toil 

Till plenty flowed about ; 
A lusty life was in the soil 

His touch brought blooming out. 

"He was a worthy man, I thought, 

And I had heard him say 
How for his country he had fought 

On many a bloody day. 

"At summer noon, oft in my shade, 

His children by his side. 
He went once more his marches o'er 

With all a soldier's pride. 

« 
"And now the soil he trod was free, 

Though ridged with patriots' graves. 



59 



6o THE STORY OF THE PINE. 

Strange that a land so won could be 
The home, alas ! of slaves. 

*' The years rolled on, the cot was gone, 

A mansion took its place ; 
The aged settler near it slept, 

The sod above his face. 

" The wild deer came to drink no more 
By moonlight from the lake ; 

The wolf had sought a wilder shore, 
The panther left the brake. 

*' Where the wide forest used to be. 
Now flowed the yellow wheat. 

And wave on wave its saffron sea 
Broke gently at my feet. 

"A monster, breathing fire and steam. 
Now often crossed the plain 

Swift as the wind, — the iron dream 
Of some mechanic brain. 

"Another, breathed with fiercer fire. 

Upon the lake went by ; 
And later, lines of trilling wire 

Were ruled along the sky. 



THE STORY OF THE PINE. 

"Alas, I sighed, for what has been, 
And what no more shall be ! 

But still the tide of life rolled in, 
Resistless as the sea. 

*'To sudden empire, rich and great. 
The brave young nation grew; 

Star after star, each star a State, 
Shone on her banner's blue. 

'' A city by each ocean's side 

She seated, like a queen ; 
And others by her brineless seas 

And on her prairies green. 

** But now a cry of treason rose, 
And skies no more were fair ; 

A gloom, a chill, a threat of ill 
Were in the uneasy air. 

" Woe to that land and to that race. 
Though fortune long be kind, 

Where Glory holds the foremost place 
While Justice hides behind ! 

As some hot cloud that, far away. 
Gathers in gloom and strength, 
6* 



62 THE STORY OF THE PINE. 

Thunders and threatens all the day, 
And furious comes at length, 

''So o'er a nation foul with wrong — 

A country slavery-cursed — 
The cloud of war that threatened long 

With earthquake-fury burst. 

'' Oh ! speak not of that dreadful spring. 

Name not its fears again. 
For even Nature failed to bring 

Her usual gladness then. 

*' The only and the anxious thought 

Was of the rising war ; 
The bloom and brightness that she brought 

Rejoiced the world no more. 

'' Enough to know that they whose blood 
Was poured like summer rain, 

Whose graves are thick in field and wood, 
Have perished not in vain. 

''Thy winds, O Freedom ! blown to-day 
From mountain-tops or waves. 

Nowhere, with joy I hear them say. 
Become the breath of slaves ! 



SIXTY-EIGHT AND SIXTY-NINE. 63 

*' Was it this happy end to see 

That Heaven delayed my fall ? 
Hail, liberal land ! where all are free, 

Are free and equal all ! 

*'Let some resistless wind advance, ^ 

Or 'gainst my top so high 
The lightning break its fiery lance, — 

I'm ready now to die." 

But still, firm-rooted in the land. 

With branches waving wide, 
The old Pine towers green and grand 

Its native lake beside. 



SIXTY-EIGHT AND SIXTY-NINE. 

(IN THE MANNER OF PRAED.) 
"There is no new thing, my friend." — CHARLES DiX. 

The sun is faithful to the sky : 
He brings the promised morrow ; 

The midnight saw the Old Year die, 
And no one seems to sorrow. 

The old man rises with a sigh, 
But age and ache give warning; 



64 SIXTY-EIGHT AND SIXTY-NINE. 

The youth is glad, he knows not why, 

To meet the New Year morning. 
Ah ! birth is new, and death is old, 

The greater rules the lesser ; 
And he who lieth dumb and cold 

Hath left a brave successor. 
So let the dead Year lie in state. 

We court the next in line: 
The world is done with Sixty-eight 

And ready for Sixty-nine. 

There are some men to whom a sigh 

Is sweeter sound than laughter. 
And some so dull that when they die 

Care not if joy live after. 
They grieve that earth will warm with spring, 

While they are growing colder. 
And would not have one lovely thing 

Exist if they must moulder. 
But he would scorn the selfish throng, 

The Year so generous-hearted, 
And would not have us mourn too long 

O'er things that have departed. 
*' Away ! away !" would the Old Year say, 

'' Night and the grave are mine." 
Then leave the silent Sixty-eight 

For the living Sixty-nine. 



SIXTY-EIGHT AND SIXTY-NINE. 65 

And so we seek, in the world's wide track, 

The fields our feet are worn to, 
And drop out sentiment, and go back 

To the matters we were born to. 
And many will feel, and some will say. 

To self if not each other. 
How dreadfully, in a general way. 

One year is like another ! 
What will be has already been : 

Politics to satiety. 
With an earthquake or a war thrown in 

To make up a variety ; 
Mosquitoes early, and house-flies late. 

With the same old sun to shine, — 
We must take the old of Sixty-eight 

For the new of Sixty-nine. 

Death will hurry his millions off, 

And Life produce them faster ; 
And every mail will bring its tale 

Of changes and disaster. 
Thieves will steal, and banks will break. 

And murders be committed ; 
Small rogues be punished for justice' sake. 

And greater ones acquitted. 
Of shipwrecks there will be no lack. 

Nor of floods and conflagrations. 



66 SIXTY-EIGHT AND SIXTY-NINE. 

And railway trains will leave the track, 

With the usual aggravations. 
And all that happens, and much that don't, 

In many a startling line, 
Will the press relate, as in Sixty-eight, 

For the readers of Sixty-nine. 

*' Bulls" and ^^ bears" will throng the town, 

With looks now bright, now pallid. 
And gold go up, and gold go down. 

Like "the world" in Kingsley's ballad. 
Courtships will go on, of course. 

And Tom outrival Harry; 
Last year's married seek divorce. 

And last year's lovers marry. 
The exquisite will wear his " tights," 

And the laborer his patches. 
And Congress may take, for the latter's sake. 

The heavy tax off matches. 
The Grecian Bend perhaps will end. 

And relieve the human spine ; 
But follies as great as of Sixty-eight 

We shall see in Sixty-nine. 

The papers of the growing grain 
Trite prophecies will utter. 



SIXTY-EIGHT AND SIXTY-NINE. 67 

And buyers another year complain 

Of the shocking price of butter. 
And people will love dearly still 

Their neighbors' faults to mention, 
And think too much of others' sins 

To give their own attention ; 
And o'er and o'er a sinner's fall 

Will tell with such a spirit, 
You're forced to think that, after all, 

They're rather pleased to hear it. 
Let sages frown and preachers prate, 

Alas 1 we're not divine, 
And the human nature of Sixty-eight 

Will flourish in Sixty-nine. 

It is not things, but we, that change, — 

Not always for the better. 
Perhaps the spirit's wider range 

Is free from fall and fetter. 
Our earth-life is a restless chase; 

With faltering feet or steady 
We hasten to that silent place 

The year has reached already. 
But love will ever conquer fear, , 

Joy quite forsake us never; 
Some blessed hope is always near. 

Some good remains forever. 



68 THE CHEERFUL SLAVE. 

So, " with a heart for any fate," 
We join Life's marching line, 

With a last good-by to Sixty-eight 
And a cheer for Sixty-nine. 



THE CHEERFUL SLAVE. 

I. 
Bound • bound ! 
Gold is king ; 
Gold is king, 
And long been crowned, 
Silver is an 
Honored peer ; 
I a base 
Plebeian thing, 
All ungifted 
With the grace 
Of prince or lord ; 
All unworthy 
To come near, 
Save when lifted 
From my poor 
State obscure. 



THE CHEERFUL SLAVE. 69 

With no odor 
Of the boor, 
As the Sword 
I dare appear. 



Toil! toil! 
Day and night. 
In the sea 
And in the soil, 
"While those honored 
Idlers lie, 
Undefiled 

And f;\ir and bright, 
Scorning as I 
Pass them by, 
Plodding in my 
Peasant plight. 
Humbly, illy 
I compare 
With their proud 
Patrician air. 



III. 

Servant, slave. 
Yet friend of all, 

7 



70 



PERPLEXED. 

Few such- service 

Ever gave 

As I give 

In hut and hall, — 

Give and ever 

Give, though small 

Be my pay 

In thought or thank. 

'Tis enough 

For me to live, 

Kingly only 

In my uses, 

In the good 

My life diffuses. 

So, content, 

I take my rank. 



PERPLEXED. 

Despite of good and gain, 

Our human doubts remain. 

And even dare arraign 
The Great Goodness in an unholy light. 

Such doubts come over me ; 

I look around and see 
Things that I can but question, — "Are they right?" 



PERPLEXED. 71 

No voice replies from out the silences, 
And further doubt my only answer is. 



The world seems full of wrong ; 

The weak obey the strong ; 

Rights, that to men belong 
As sacredly as love belongs to God, 

Power's ruthless bands invade, 

And men once free are made 
Lowly obedient to the tyrant's nod. 
Thou sayest, Lord, that vengeance rests with Thee ; 
Then why so oft goes the oppressor free ? 

The rich have wealth increased ; 

And foremost at the feast 

Sit those who gathered least 
Through all the busy summer's heat and dust. 

The peasant, whose sad toil 

Secured the harvest spoil, 
Stands humbly waiting for the broken crust ; 
And when the revel of his lord is o'er. 
Receives his mite, nor dares to ask for more. 

Has good its sure reward ? 
In strife 'gainst error's sword 
Truth's champions have poured 
Their reddest blood in vainest offerin.s: ; 



72 GENTLE RAIN. 

And Time's best age has seen 

Man's fellow, poor and mean, 
Scourged, bleeding, bound, — a toiling, groaning thing 
Yet lands that bind and lands that break the chain 
Have equal blessing of the sun and rain. 

The dust of strife surrounds, 

And from its gloom resounds 
The noise of Life's great conflict, loud and nigh ; 

*' God helps the weaker side !" 

*' Oh ! then, why does He hide 
The signs of its sure triumphing?" I cry. 
A whisper caught from the swift winds that passed, 
Made sweetest answer to my listening ear: 
"Be still, sad heart ; all things shall be made clear 

At last, at last." 



GENTLE RAIN. 

And thou hast come once more 
To bless us, gentle rain ! 

From yonder cloudy shore 
Thy light wave rolls again. 

Earth's high blue roof till now 
Seemed blazing all about, 



GENTLE RAIN. 73 

Fired by the sun ! but thou 
Hast put the wide flames out. 

With the fierce pomp of storm 

Thou art not rushing nigh ; 
No thunders loud alarm, 

Closed is the lightning's eye. 

His song th' unfrightened bird 

Still pours in yonder tree, 
Whose dripping leaves are stirred 

Less by the wind than thee. 

Adown the dimming sky 

The cooled delicious day 
Sinks softly as a sigh. 

And still thy small drops play. 

This is my dream of death, — 

After the glare and heat, 
A gently failing breath. 

Calmed and content and sweet. 

And some delicious sound, 

Like thine, sweet rain, to fill 
My ear before the round 

Of life shall stand quite still. 
7* 



74 FACES AT THE WINDOW. 

Then I would close mine eyes, 
Sure that the dawn would be 

Fair as to-morrow's skies 
Shall witness, after thee ! 



FACES AT THE WINDOW. 

In quiet village or noisy town, 

I love, as I wander through streets and lanes, 
When day is up or when night is down, 

To watch the faces that come to the panes, 
By windows of houses high and grand. 
By those of the humblest in the land, — 
The lordly home of the millionaire. 

And the dark abodes of shame and sin, 
Seldom I pass that I do not care 

To see what faces may be within. 

Some look out so happy and round. 

Some so wan and haggard and wild ; 
I wonder if ever the first have frowned. 
And if the others have ever smiled. 
Ah ! wonderful f^ices I often meet 
In my portrait-gallery of the street ; 
Some with brows like an open book, 

Whose thoughts you can read like the printed page, 



FACES AT THE WEXDOIV. 



x\nd one, wrinkled and old, with a look 
That I like to have belong to age. 



'Tis that of a snowy-haired old man ; 

He lives in a poor and lowly place, 
But I go that way whenever I can, 

Just to glance at his saintly face ; 

Lonely and gray, I know he has given 
Up every hope but that of heaven. 
He has lived through many and sorrowful days,-- 

I heard his story once, with a sigh ; 
But I hardly pity him, for he will gaze 

Soon out of the windows of the sky. 

Sometimes 'tis the face of a fond young wife 

That is looking out where the curtains part, 
In her arms a little and laughing life. 

And a mother's happiness in her heart ; 
And I know she is waiting there to greet 
The coming of absent and loving feet. 
How sure is the glance of her tender eye ! 

She leaves the window and goes to the door; 
She has seen a form that will not pass by; 

It bends to hers, and her watching is o'er. 

Stern, rough fiices, and f.ices fair ; 

Faces that seldom have known a tear; 



75 



76 FACES AT THE WINDOW. 

Thoughtful faces, and faces of care ; 
All by turns at the window appear. 
And often and often I hear, as I pass, 
A patter of fingers against the glass, 
And a glimpse of childish brows I catch, — 

Oh, beautiful living pictures of youth ! 
Heaven forever over them watch, 

And keep them bright with the tints of truth ! 

But turn from such, and wander with me 

From the golden light and fresh, free air. 
To poverty's wretchedest haunts, and see 

The faces that look from the windows there. 
Some so sunken and thin and pale, 
Telling of want a pitiful tale ; 
Some whose eyes have a glare of hate ; 

And others, oh, God ! I can see them now. 
Stony and dark and desolate. 

With not a sign of soul on the brow. 

But the saddest of all I see are those 

I sometimes find in the darkening street, 
When the rude wind of the winter blows, 
And the air is chill with frost and sleet. 
Poor little faces outside of the pane. 
White with the snow or wet with the rain. 



TO- DA y. 77 

Gazing wistfully in from the cold, 

Bright with a glow that does not warm. 

Poor little lambs with never a fold, 
Poor little wanderers in the storm. 

Oh, faces that look from lofty home, 

Or from the roofs where the wretched go, 
Oh, simple, quiet faces that come 

To cottage windows, narrow and low, 
Oh, glad faces that make ?ne glad, 
Oh, sad faces that make ?ne sad, 
Is there not coming a perfect day 

When you all with a common love will shine. 
After the worm has eaten this clay. 

Moulded in ima2:e of Him divine? 



TO-DAY 



Not well for him who to the past 

A blind faith pins ; 
Not always where one age toiled last 

The next begins. 
For centuries from Time's womb cast 

Are not born twins. 



78 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 

New truth awakes to us each day, 

And its strong tide 
Our poor weak hands may never stay ; 

But far and wide, 
It sweeps our old landmarks away 

On every side. 

Away with those who set their store 

By ancient creeds; 
The vain philosophies of yore 

Are not our needs ; 
To-day the world is calling for — 

Not words, but deeds. 



JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 

In one of the apartments of a private dwelling-house in Philadel- 
phia is a marble mantel, bearing on its front a small oval mark or blur, 
the work of nature, which is recognized by all to whom it is pointed 
out as an exact picture of the poet John G. Whittier. The polish of 
the marble gives an exquisite finish to this unique portrait, and the 
following lines are suggested by the beauty and singularity of the 
whole. 

Doth Nature love her poet so, 

That she delights to trace 
Upon the marble's spotted snow 

The soulful singer's face? 



STILL YOUNG. 

How match her love-proofs with our own. 

Be hers sweet chance or art ! 
She paints his features on the stone, 

And we upon the heart. 



79 



STILL YOUNG. 

INSCRIBED TO R. B. 

Thy form is bowed with age, my friend, 
And thou hast passed thy life's full prime; 

Thou near'st the inevitable end. 
But with no terror of the time. 

Thine aged face long since has lost 
The freshness of an earlier day, 

And on thy head has gathered frost 
That summer suns melt not away. 

And yet like those thou dost not seem 

Who in the later walks of life 
Review the traveled path, and deem 

It one long way of pain and strife. 

Thy blood along thy veins may start 
With slower coursing than of old. 



8o STILL YOUNG. 

And yet it comes not from a heart 

That years have power to render cold. 

Earth still for thee with beauty glows, 
And things of joy and love are born; 

Dark skies yet brighten, and the rose 
Still gives its fragrance with the thorn. 

Though dimness o'er the vision creep, 
And roses from the cheek depart, 

They never can be old who keep 
The joyous youth-time of the heart. 

O'er thee Faith holds her wings, and, like 
A mother-bird upon the nest. 

Keeps off the coldness that would strike 
The summer from thy hopeful breast. 

The beauty that around us lies, — 

And when is beauty from our sight ? — 

Thou gratefully dost recognize, 
Not as temptation, but delight. 

Some there have been — some there are still- 
So dull, so virtuous, so severe, 

That it appears to them an ill 
To gather daily pleasures here. 



STILL YOUXG. ^i 

The innocent and fine delights 

Which Heaven surely meant for all 

As portion of our needs and rights, 
They can but fair temptations call. 

Such narrowness thou dost condemn. 

There is religion e'en in art ; 
Thou hast no sympathy with them 

Who free the mind but bind the heart. 

Song is not sin, love is not lust. 

Beauty we need not tremble at ; 
What shame to say God could not trust 

His human creatures more than that ! 

Between us and the open skies, 

Save melting clouds, there are no bars, — 
O man ! thy earthly pathway lies 

Between the flowers and the stars ! 

And long ago, my friend, I know 
To thee was this conviction given : 

Not joylessly should mortals go 
By such a pathway into heaven. 

January, 1868, 



82 TO ONE DEPARTED, 



TO ONE DEPARTED. 

We have seen thee in thy coffin, — 
Or thy beautiful, cold clay, — 

Kissed thy dead lips once and often, 
Closed thy grave, and come away. 

''It is finished," — it is over, — 
All that sad and painful part ; 

Green the grass thy grave doth cover. 
Close the clay enfolds thy heart. 

But now memory turneth to thee, 
Doing well her tender part ; 

And we see thee as we know thee. 
As thou wast — and as thou art. 

For in spiritual feature 

Shines thy sweet face all the while ; 
If her dead were dead, dear Nature 

Could not thus rejoice and smile. 

But in vain our earth-love's wooing, — 
In some far-off, radiant sphere 

Thou art living, loving, doing. 
Now as always, — but not here ! 



THE GRASS. 

Ah, not here ! and we have only- 
Tender memories of thee left ; 

While the crowded world seems lonely, 
Of thy presence bright bereft. 

Ne'er again thy smile will greet us. 
Though its light we hunger for ; 

Never will thy form, to meet us. 
Glide like sunshine to the door. 

Friend, adviser, sister, mother, — 
These were all in thee combined ; 

Fare thee well ! there is no other 
Tike thee for our hearts to find. 



83 



THE GRASS. 



Hail to you, my cheerful friend, 

Whom I meet with everywhere. 
In whom use and beauty blend 

Perfectly as light with air. 
You do not, I fear, receive 

Half the praise that is your due. 
Though I never will believe 

That your friends are few. 



84 THE GRASS. 

Heel and hoof upon you trample, 

Yet, to see it if we care, 
You afford a sweet example 

Of what patient faith can bear. 
When the battle's bloody dew 

Dieth on the broken sod. 
Quick to hide the painful hue 

From the sight of God, 

Into your own guiltless growth 

You absorb the awful stain. 
Planting life and beauty both 

In the red footprints of Cain ! 
When straightway you softly creep 

To the graves of friends and foes, 
And alike above their sleep 

Spread your green repose. 

Many a lesson true you teach us. 

Many a wholesome hint you give, 
Many a silent sermon preach us. 

In the lowly life you live. 
Though the tree above you towers. 

Envy with you is not found ; 
Pride you have not, though the flowers 

Show it all around. 



THE GRASS. 85 

Very lowly is your station, 

But you pine not at your place, — 
There is no humiliation 

Known to cheerfulness and grace. 
Ever toiling you are seen, 

All the land you wander through, 
Till you spread your grateful green 

Broad as heaven's blue. 

In the city, which the sorest 

Needs you for its crimes and pains, 
In the temples of the forest. 

Where a constant sabbath reigns. 
Round our homesteads, round our graves. 

Loved by all, you wander free ; 
Oft the dying vision craves 

Its last glimpse of you shall be. 

Voiceless and yet full of voices 

Are you, and I love to lie 
With you when the year rejoices, 

'Neatly the open summer sky. 
Who shall say that when the heats 

Of the ripe June on you shine, 
That the life that in you beats 

Is not kin to mine ? 
8* 



^(, THE GRASS. 

Far from passion, pain, and riot, 

On the meadow's flowery floor. 
Oh to feel your cooling quiet ! 

Heaven's rest need be no more ! 
At such times, forsake me. Care ! 

Busy brain, your working cease ! 
Earth is downy, and the air 

An expanded peace. 

All the world may wander by me : 

Am I faint, — you give me rest ; 
Am I lonely, — you supply me 

With companionship the best. 
Doubt our human love who can ? 

Not I ; yet I never drew 
Sweeter sympathy from man 

Than I find in you. 

To assert it may be sin. 

But I dare to think it true : 
Nothing on the earth has been, 

Since the Christ, so good as you. 
Courage, constancy, and love — 

You are active type of all. 
Who more works or faith can prove ? 

Neither John nor Paul ! 



HARVES T- TIME. 8 7 



HARVEST-TIME. 



Slowly the starlight fades away ; 
A faintest tinge of reddening gray- 
Flames in the East's low horizon, heraldic of the coming 
day. 

II. 

The pale moon hides her silver horn, 
And, on the rising breezes borne, 
A hundred waking voices break the dewy silence of the 
morn. 

III. 

From tangled brake and leafy hill 
Goes up the birds' rejoicing trill, 
Till all the listening skies above with Nature's sweet- 
tuned music fill. 

IV. 

And as the songsters gayly chime. 
The first young beams of morning climb 
And mingle in one glare, to light the long, glad hours 
of harvest-time. 



88 tfAR VES r- TIME. 

V. 
Bright o'er the earth the full day breaks; 
The sleeping world to life awakes, 
And rested Labor leaves his couch and to his toil 
himself betakes. 

VI. 

Forth to the field, a sturdy throng, 
The harvesters, with laugh and song, 
From many a farm-house white outpour and haste 
with earnest step along. 

VII. 

Slow moving through the ripened fields, 
His gleaming blade the reaper wields 
With tireless arm ; and, falling low, the waiting 
grain unto him yields. 

VIII. 

Atid, following close, the binder leaves 
His pathway strewn with yellow sheaves. 
That rustle in the summer wind like rain-drops on 
dead autumn leaves. 

IX. 

Upon the harvest air there steals 
The roll of verdure-muffled wheels, 
As onward pass the patient teams, the wain low 
rumbling at their heels. 



SUMMER HYMN. 89 



Halted among the gathered sheaves, 
A precious freight it quick receives, 
Then, winding o'er the stubble slopes, unloads beneath 
the sheltering eaves. 

XI. 

As thus they reap the fruitful lands, 
Oh ! let us humbly clasp our hands, 
And in all truth and reverence ask God's blessing on 
the harvest bands ! 



SUMMER HYMN. 

A VISIBLE blessing rests upon the land, 

With joy the heart of man was never sweeter; 
Summer has almost reached the Autumn's hand. 

That seems outstretched to greet her. 
Her work is done, and to her rest she goeth, 

Making a fragrance of her dying breath, 
While round her path a golden glory gloweth, 

Lighting her steps to death. 

It is a solemn hour, and yet not sad ; 

The corn-fields rustle, and the waters glisten. 



90 



SUMMER HYMN. 



1 
The forests sweep around us green and glad, 

With music in each leaflet if we listen. 
And they know, and, knowing, are subdued, 

In all their joy, that Summer's strength is failing 
There is a tenderness in Nature's mood 

That soon will wake to wailing. 

A lovelier season never on us smiled. 

Her presence seemed so living and so human ; 
Spring was the wayward and capricious child. 

Summer the loving woman. 
We part from her as from a cherished friend 

Who unto gentle, painless death is given, 
And on whose face remaineth to the end 

A look as if of heaven. 

Unblamed, may we not think there is a spirit 

Of the departed Summer that survives, 
And in some higher region doth inherit 

The crown of perfect lives? 
If this should be, what glory must await 

The beauteous season, not yet quite departed ! 
Faithful was she in her first estate. 

Full-handed and free-hearted. 

Never had toil more liberal reward. 

More bountiful was not Earth's first fruition : 



SUMMER HYMN. 91 

Her ancient vigor seems almost restored, 

And hope is man's condition. 
God of the harvest ! all good gifts Thou hast given : 

Sunlight and dew, and most the blessed rain, 
That, 'twixt the green of earth, the blue of heaven, 

Swung glad its silver chain. 

We thank Thee that once more our eyes behold 

The miracle of Nature's resurrection : 
While not a grass-blade grew, nor blossom swelled. 

Outside of Thy protection. 
The snow's delay, the sunshine's recompense. 

The mountain's and the meadow's gradual green- 
ing,— 
On all we looked, with no diminished sense 

Of their sublimer meaning. 

Disastrous blight, as sometimes, came not near, 

Nor War and Pestilence, those dread marauders; 
Untimely frosts did not descend to sear ; 

No fierce tornado crossed our fruitful borders. 
In peace we watched the days come up in splendor ; 

The dreamy noons soft-sunk in sunny rest ; 
The many-colored sunsets burning tender. 

Like mornings in the west. 

How full of God seemed all those glowing hours ! 
Nature rebuked the skeptic and the doubter ; 



92 



TOHICKON. 

Faith took again the simple form of flowers, 

While Love rejoiced about her. 
That time is past, and now the shortening days 

Hint of decay and take a tinge of sadness, 
But still are full of pleasantness and praise, — 

The after-harvest gladness. 

Soon fiercely forth invading winds will rush 

Through mountain pass and under forest columUj 
And northern nights come down with frigid hush, 

Unpitying and solemn. 
Welcome that time of tempest and of snow ! 

The skies will still repeat their starry story. 
And through the gloom a future Summer show, 

Crowned with the olden glory. 

August 28, 1869. 



TOHICKON. 



Sweet, quiet spot ! it was a summer noon 
When first amid thy solitudes I strayed ; 

As if thyself had bid, with joyous tune, 

Thy songsters welcome to thy rest and shade. 

Bright shone the sun in rich meridian glare. 
And all thy trees waved invitation sweet. 



TOHICKON. 



93 



As the warm pulses of the dreamy air 

Softly among their screening branches beat. 

We were a merry band, — for not alone 

I sought to pass those few swift hours with thee ; 

Thy beauteous haunts, I ween, had seldom known 
The presence of a goodlier company. 

Where the thick curtains of thy woods, o'erhead 
Drawn green and dim, cast down their coolest shade, 

Around a rock, that maidens' hands had spread 
With plenteous feast, a full repast we made. 

Then down thy slopes, that green before us lay, 
Into thy low, delightful vale we strolled ; 

By rugged path and tangled winding way 

We flanked thy heights, precipitous and bold. 

Thy loneliest nook had felt the thirsty gleam 
Of the ripe sunshine falling hot and red. 

And, from its banks, we saw thy famished stream 
With rippled surface creep along its bed. 

Here, dark and still, it wound its current where 
The cooling shadows of thy cliffs were thrown, 

And farther on, 'gainst bars that, brown and bare, 
Were interposed, it broke with lowly moan. 
9 



94 



TOHICKON. 



As by its sides I watched the white groups pass, 
Or saw them o'er it bend with perfect grace, 

It seemed to smile, I thought, when, like a glass, 
It gave reflection of some lovely face. 

Then on again with sluggish, devious flow. 
It purled and fretted by thy rocky piles; 

Its waters scant with bubbles all aglow. 

That wrecked themselves against its little isles. • 

The autumn rains would fall, I knew, until. 
With generous floods its every source supplied. 

The sleeping echoes of thy russet hill 

Would wake in answer to its roaring tide. 

The hours sped on ; the sun, low in the skies. 

Warned that we could no longer with thee dwell ; 

So from thy scenes we turned our lingering eyes, 
When to them we had looked a long farewell. 

Yet to thee oft, Tohickon, I will turn, 

When memory leads me in her gentle train ; 

Thy charms I will recall, until I yearn 
To feel their holy influence again. 

When, by the troubled days in which we live, — 
Their rude alarms, their strifes that never cease, — 



TOHICKON. 95 

I am oppressed, if then to thee I give 

One moment's thought, that moment will be peace. 

Sweet hermit spot ! with thee the home might be 
Of those who from their fellows live alway, — 

Stern anchorites, and sages gray, — ah me ! 
The world would only laugh at such to-day ! 

And yet in haunts like thine, far from the sound 
. Of noisy reasoning and vain dispute. 
Men truly wise and good there might be found. 
As thickest foliage hides the rarest fruit. 

Thine is no classic ground ; but, lone and fair, 
A garden-place^ by Nature planned, thou art ; 

Where the wild Beautiful may be, and where 
The fading works of man can have no part. 

Were I to come, when I had passed my youtli. 
Once more amid thy loveliness to range, 

The same old scenes would speak the sad, sad truth : 
It is not things, so much as men, that change, 

August, 1864. 



96 A DAY IN OCTOBER. 



A DAY IN OCTOBER. 

I WANDER far by field and glen, 
The hazy skies are hanging low ; 

The breeze awhile is strong, and then 
Forgets to blow. 

His curious web the spider weaves 
O'er late-green acres growing brown ; 

Like wounded birds, the colored leaves 
Are fluttering down. 

As red are those yon maple shows 
As if the drops that wet the wood 
Last night had not been rain, but blood. 

Of berries bright the hedge is full ; 

The bay-bush blushes as with shame ; 
The sumach's plume is like a dull 
But steady flame. 
Erect the pointed poplars stand, 

Proud to display their fluttering gold ; 
The rough pine towers green and grand, 

Unhurt by cold. 
The scarlet brier seems all on fire. 



A DAY IN OCTOBER. g^ 



And in the breeze the golden-rod 
Waves stiffly o'er the frosted sod. ^ 

At times the bright woodpecker knocks 
With sound that seems the wood to jar ; 

The wild fowl northward fly in flocks 
Triangular. 

Beyond the upland, sear and dry, 

On which the scattered heaps of corn 

Like spots of yellower sunshine lie, 
A smoke is borne 

In languid drifts ; then white uplifts. 
And, like some earth-freed spirit fair. 
Ascends the steep and stairless air. 

I leave the upland, broad and bright, 
And to the hoary woodland stray ; 
There, with a solemn, softened light. 
Shines the still day. 
Oh, beautiful ! through stained glass 
Never such light as this did pour ; 
Almost in awe along I pass ; 

A marble floor, 
Instead of moss, I seem to cross, 
As if my feet, invading, trod 
Some inmost sanctuary of God. 
9^ 



98 



INDIAN SUMMER. 



INDIAN SUMMER. 

The Autumn, brown and late, is forth, 

Yet storms delay awhile ; 
A sweet, sad light is over earth, — 

'Tis Summer's dying smile. 
From field and fern she could not go, 

And all she loved before, 
Without one last fond look, and so 

She comes to them once more. 

As we go last to look on some 

Dear face whence life has fled, 
So doth the mourner Summer come 

To gaze upon her dead. 
The Autumn marks her features wan, 

And, seeing that she grieves. 
He comforts her as best he can, 

And strews her paths with leaves. 

The chilling winds he doth repress 
Which would about her blow. 

And shows by his rough tenderness 
That he respects her woe. 



THE FROST. 

Ah ! little he can for her do ; 

He brings no rainbow-showers ; 
He cannot tint her hills anew, 

Nor give her back her flowers. 

And when her pensive eyes behold 

The change wrought by decay, 
She feels her feeble limbs grow cold, 

Her heart-warmth pass away. 
And, with that sad smile on her face. 

She lowly droops her head 
In tender and expiring grace, 

And dies beside her dead. 



99 



THE FROST. 



I COME, I come from my Arctic halls. 
Where the iceberg rears its glittering walls, 
And the billows break with a sullen roar 
'Gainst the snowy cliffs of the polar shore. 

I have lingered long in a cheerless clime. 
While the year has had its bud and prime. 
And the golden harvest sprung from the sod* 
Of the desert fields that the winter trod. 



lOo THE FROST. 

As one for a triumph waits, so I 
Have lain, while the sun in the southern sky 
Sank lower down, and shortened his march 
Through the glowing space of the azure arch. 

For not till his sultry strength was spent, 

And his fire-shod feet retreating went 

Toward the South's bright gates, dared I venture forth 

From my fortress home in the frozen North. 

Over mountain and plain, away, away ! 
I follow the track of the flying day ; 
And the green earth thrills with a silent fear. 
As she feels me come with the darkness near. 

With crystal bridges I span the streams. 

And onward I sweep 'neath the moon's cold beams. 

Till not a lone spot is there left uncrossed 

By the flying form of the demon Frost. 

Where I scatter the flakes of my driftless snow. 
The light of the rosy morn will show 
The beautiful wonders my hand has wrought, 
Swift as the whirlwind, silent as thought. 

To the dim, hushed woods in my flight I turn. 
And to-morrow their fated leaves will burn 



THE FROST. loi 

With a hundred hues, as false as the glow 
That flushes the cheek when the life is low. 

The chestnuts drop at the touch of my wand, 
And the shellbarks, brushed by my viewless hand, 
Rebound from the turf or plash in the rill, 
Though the loaded boughs of the trees are still. 

Oh, joy for the groups that at early morn 
Come brushing their way through the wet-leafed corn. 
When they find, 'neath the colored leaves they stir, 
The scattered wealth of the hull and burr ! 

The grass, the corn, and the late green wheat 
Feel the icy tread of my silent feet, 
And soon to take they will all be seen 
The Autumn's brown for the Summer's green. 

Alas for the flowers ! to them my breath 
Is like a blast from a land of death ; 
Though some bloom on as if they knew 
Tliat the blighting frost is but colder dew. 

But though I bring to the fields so gay 

A terror that takes their gladness away, 

Though the bloom and fragrance of sun-grown things 

Must fade when I pass on my shadowy wings. 



I02 THE ICE-KING. 

Yet a sweeter air and a lovelier sky 

Shall follow me far as I hasten by ; 

And though clouds succeed, and white storms fall, 

A promise of life lies warm in them all. 

Beyond the darkness, beyond the cold, 
The map of the Spring is in beauty unrolled ; 
And glory and brightness descend to the Earth, 
As they did when the stars rejoiced at her birth ! 

As frost to the fields, so death comes to men ; 
They perish — but only to flourish again. 
So, mortals, take courage, and fear not the blast • 
That blows when the summer of life is past. 



THE ICE-KING. 

In the far regions of the North there dwells a monarch 

grim. 
King of those ever-frozen realms, that, unexplored and 

dim, 
Are spread around the distant pole, and, dumb and 

dead and white, 
Lie always in the shadow of one grand, eternal night. 



THE ICE- KING. 103 

A mighty king is he ; 
No other king may be, 
Of all earth's sovereign rulers, so much a king as he. 

We feel the bitter north wind blow, — it only is his 

breath ; 
Like arctic darkness is his frown, his very look is death ; 
And never to his presence dread dare mortal's footsteps 

go,— 
He is a hermit and a king, and in his robes of snow, 
Grand, terrible, and lone. 
He sits upon his throne. 
The never-dying monarch of an ever-freezing zone. 

Loyal his subjects are, but few, — the frost, the cloud, 

the storm. 
Obedient to his least behest, around his awful form 
Gather their might, or speed away o'er his dominions 

far; 
Free even as himself, yet they his willing servants are : 
No trembling vassal stands 
To list to his commands. 
For he no king of people is, but of unpeopled lands. 

Built of the glittering, silver ice, his palaces arise, 
Tlieir shining turrets reaching towards the cold stars in 
the skies. 



I04 THE ICE-KING. 



Cities of purest ice he rears, and paves with ice the 

streets, 
Breaks off the icebergs from his shores, and sails them 
as his fleets, 

And o'er his drear domain. 
Upon each hill and plain. 
He hoards the deep, abundant snows, and counts them 
as his gain. 

When he is weary with the shade of his long lowering 
nights. 

Within the hollow skies he sets his wild, mysterious 
lights. 

That, flaming through the viewless air, in our own 
heavens shine, 

And of his kingdom's glories are a beauteous, wondrous 
sign,— 

Strange meteors 'mid the gloom. 
His borders they illume. 

And are his frigid fires that burn and yet do not con- 
sume. 

Across the torrid main he floats his crystal argosies. 
And white upon the mountain-tops he plants his colo- 
nies ; 



THE ICE-KING. 1 05 

Sends his stern ministers each year to* desolate the 

earth, 
And binds her flowery, Eden fields within an icy girth, — 

A cruel king he is ; 
He spoils the realms of other kings, but they cannot 

spoil his. 

We love our green and sunny slopes, he loves his polar 

home ', 
Beneath the forest's leafy arch our feet may gayly 

roam; 
Our eyes may watch the warm waves toss and the bright 

rivers flow; 
He lives apart from our delights, a hermit-king, — and 

though 

No flowers for him unfold. 
No harvests lift their gold. 
Yet joyously he reigns amid his solitudes of cold. 



io6 WINTER NIGHT AND SUMMER NOON. 



THE WINTER NIGHT AND THE 
SUMMER NOON. 

The moon is down, and the night is chill, 
The silent snow-flakes flutter and fall. 

And the stars, that I know are in the skies, 
Through the gloom I cannot see at all. 

Here, where the firelight falls so clear. 
Flooding the room with a rosy tide, 

I sit, as the sombre hours wear on. 
And list to the moan of the storm outside. 

Its warning given, twelve measured strokes 
The old clock peals from the chimney-shelf, 

In tones as solemn and weird and strange 
As if 'twere the voice of time itself. 

Bleaker without grows the lonely night. 

And, as louder the troubled blast complains. 

Against my window I hear a sound 

As if ghostly fingers touched the panes. 

'Tis only the beat of the driving flakes. 
Wilder whirled to the earth below, 



WINTER NIGHT AND SUMMER NOON 107 

Till village and vale and hill are lost 

In a wide, white waste of midnight snow. 



I gaze without on the desolate scene, 

While a gentle sorrow comes to my breast 

As I think of the beautiful year I loved 
Under these snow-flakes laid at rest. 

The beautiful year, with its days of light, 
Its cheeks of rose, and its garlanded brow, 

Its brooks, its birds, and its forests green, 

Its flowers and harvests, — where are they now ? 

The streams are hushed, and the birds are flown. 
And the flowers, since the frost put out their bloom. 

Under their shroud of snow have lain. 
Like friends of ours in the silent tomb. 

But why should I sigh? for the spring will come, 
And break for the streams their icy chain ; 

The earth will awake from its sleep of death, 
And blossom and bloom with beauty again. 

And, if for the dead of the woods ard fields 
This beautiful future shall come to pass. 

Oh ! what of the dead that we have lost ? 
Can they be less than the leaves and grass ? 



Io8 THE STREAM OF THE VALLEY. 

Blow, blow, ye winds from the stormy north, 
And drift, ye snows from the sullen skies ! 

Still through the wail of the storm I hear 
Faith on her rustling pinions rise. 

And I will not set my songs of life 

To slow and sorrowful tunes, 
For there isn't a year with its winter nights 

But there follow the summer noons. 

What though the tempest roar o'erhead. 
And the land be drear as the frozen pole ? 

There's a summer noon of light for the earthy 
A summer noon of life for the soul ! 



THE STREAM OF THE VALLEY. 

Thou murmuring stream ! 
Whose silver length shines through the purple valley, 
Beside thy banks oft have I loved to dally. 
And feel the peace that thou art ever bringing ; 

And see thy smiles, and hear thy song, 

As windingly thou flowest along, 
With ripples for thy smiles, and rippling for thy singing. 



THE STREAM OF THE VALLEY. 109 

Since God's great hand 
Unbarred for thee the green gates of the mountains, 
And led thee, laughing, from thy secret fountains 
Down to the margin of the far-off river. 

The years have seen thee glide. 

With dimpled, bubbled tide. 
Ever changing in thy flow, and yet unchanged forever. 

On morns of spring, 
Oft have I watched the early sunshine flashing, 
First on the hills, and then along the meadow. 
Scaring before it every lingering shadow. 

Waking the wild flags from their dewy dreams, 
And gliding on until at last it seems 
To stoop and drink where thy bright waves are dashing. 

When summer skies, 

Unclouded, overarch thee, hot and glowing, 

And all thy flowers drop their modest eyes. 
Afraid to look upon their lord, the sun. 
Close to their feet they hear thy waters run. 

And turn to thee, and watch thee in thy flowing ; 

And then I fancy that their dumb lips move, 
As if to thank thee for thy care ..nd love. 

Until, at times, the impulse half obeying, 
I bend my ear, that I may hear 

What words of blessing they to thee are saying. 
10* 



no THE LAND OF NEVERMORE. 

But when the autumn brings 
The Indian-summer hours of pale October, 

And all dull things 
Are glad, and all glad things are sober. 

Most to thy presence do my footsteps stray ; 
The crimson leaves that are thy bosom staining 

Float on thy surface, like dead hopes, away, — 
They and thy waters going, but thou fore'er remaining. 

But whether morning's light 
Plays by thy brink, or whether golden -hearted 
Summer skies in glory burn above thee. 

Or whether autumn gales 

Breathe out their mournful tales 
Of a sweet summer that has just departed. 
Thou art the same, and 'tis for this I love thee. 



THE LAND OF NEVERMORE. 

There is a land forever 

Unchanged by change, though never, 
Save in memory and dreams, our feet can tread its shore; 

It is that pleasant region 

Where dwell the shining legion 
Of things that have departed, — the land of Nevermore. 



THE LAND OF NEVERMORE. m 

And unto its dominions, 

Conveyed upon the pinions 
Of tender recollection, who does not love to go ? 

For all that has been sweetest, 

Or fairest, or completest, 
In the lives that we have lived, we there again may 
know. 

To some it may be lonely, — 

To those who have had only 
A few faint joys to brighten the pathway of their 
years ; 

Yet even these the daytime 

Of youth — life's sunny May time — 
Have known and have enjoyed, and there it reappears. 

Ay, there the old and weary. 
Approaching fast death's dreary 

And terror-haunted valley, resume awhile their youth ; 
And bosoms filled with sadness 
May thrill once more with gladness, 

And lips of the deceiver may find again their truth. 

And there the mother presses 
Her babe with soft caresses, — 
That clear-eyed babe whose laughter so long ago was 
hushed ; 



112 THE LAND OF NEVERMORE. 

The maiden her lost lover 
Finds in their trysting-cover, 
Where first the sweet confession to hear and make she 
blushed. 

Love-words, so gently spoken, 

And promises now broken — 
Forgetting that they are so — we there may hear again ; 

Or grasp some former treasure, 

Or feel anew some pleasure 
From which time has extracted the poison-sting of pain. 

And restless-souled Ambition, 
That from its poor condition 
Once thought to have arisen high in fame's noontide 
beam. 
Now, hopeless and defeated. 
And still as lowly seated. 
Back to that land may wander, and dream again its 
dream. 

Warm hearts may now be near us. 

Bright eyes may shine to cheer us, 
And forms of loved and loving within our homes may 
stand ; 

But warmer hearts and truer. 

And brighter eyes and bluer. 
And faces still more lovely, are in that other land. 



THE MYSTERY. 



113 



No Present is there o'er it, 

No Future stands before it, 
Uncertain and portentous, and full of fear and doubt ; 

Nor blight nor storm can enter. 

To make our spring a winter 
And change our day to darkness, if we choose to keep 
them out. 

Then, years, so swiftly gliding. 

So short with us abiding. 
That you go by so quickly no longer we deplore \ 

For we would greatly rather 

That you would pass, and gather 
Into these fadeless ages — the years of Nevermore ! 



THE MYSTERY. 

Oh ! what a strange being this creature is 
That hath the- earth so under his sway ! 

For all things below him seem wholly his, 
To rule and use them as he may, — 

To come and go whenever he bids. 
Nor question nor dispute his way. 

He wandereth up, and he wandereth down, 
In a sort of strange unrest. 



114 ^-^^ MYSTERY. 



As though he oft sought, but never found, 

A quiet for his breast ; 
A pillow of perfect peace his head 

I'm sure hath never pressed. 

I see him abroad all over the land, 

I see him upon the main ; 
If I miss him a moment, I look once more, 

And then I see him again. 

He buildeth a city, then teareth it down, 

Then raiseth it up once more ; 
And he still toils on, till his temples stand 

Where they never have stood before ;, 
And I'm told that as he worketh now 

He hath ever worked of yore. 

He taketh the hand of his fellow in love. 

And walketh in peace by his side, 
Till he heareth a word, incautiously said, 

That woundeth his honor or pride. 
When he turneth and rendeth his comrade in wrath. 

Or pusheth him rudely aside. 

His deeds are of Greatness, of Right, and of Wrong, 
All mingled in sorest dismay ; 



THE MYSTERY. 

What seemeth at morning as noble and good 

Is evil at close of the day ; 
He gives one a serpent, another a fish, 

Then carelessly goes on his way. 

He holdeth outstretched, in the same open palm, 

The olive branch and the sword ; 
And the empires he foundeth may flourish or fall 

On the turning of a word ; 
He buildeth a palace, to die in a cot, 

And sleepeth a peasant, to wake up a lord. 

At the harvest of Peace and the harvest of War 

His sickle is equally keen. 
And I never have yet been able to tell 

Which field he most loveth to glean ; 
For he buildeth a sheaf or taketh a life 

With the same unchanging mien. 

To me the pages of human life 

Have never seemed open and fair, 
And this much only have I learned 

In all I have studied there : 
'Twas God's intention that man shouM be 

For Earth a master, for Heaven an heir. 

July 5, 1863. 



115 



IS THE WORLD OLD OR YOUNG 



IS THE WORLD OLD OR YOUNG? 



Is the World old or young, — 

A child or a man ? 
Who shall say when the life 

Of the giant began ? 
How many years still 

To the shine of the smi 
Shall he lift his broad brow, — 

Ten thousand or one ? 

II. 

Speak, voices of truth, 

Through the din of our days. 
Till we know how to shape 

Our censure or praise ; 
For the World, that we say 

Groweth hoary with years. 
Perhaps is not done 

With his infantile fears. 



Of the knowledge, the wisdom 
He boasts of to-day, 



IS THE WORLD OLD ON YOUNG? 

Like a vain, learned man, 
When his head shall be gray 

May to him appear 

As the learning of youth. 

To one aged grown 
In the study of truth. 

IV. 

The strife of his armies, 

The roll of his drums. 
May be but mock battle 

To warfare that comes ; 
Or a spirit so holy 

His breast may draw near, 
Till the peace of the past 

Shall like turmoil appear. 

V. 

O men and O brethren ! 

If there's one thing sublime 
This side of the skies, 

It is time, it is time ! 
It is time, — and the World 

May be yet in his youth. 
With ages on ages 

To live for the truth ! 



117 



Ii8 AT THE METROPOLIS. 



AT THE METROPOLIS. 

• 

Along the crowded street 

I hear the ceaseless beat 
Of myriad footsteps as they come and go ; 

And gaze, as in a dream, 

Upon life's busy stream, 
That by me has its flow and counter-flow. 

Darkly the night is down 

Upon the bustling town ; 
Still sweeps the human tide resistless on ; 

And, with a sullen roar, 

Like some rough, ocean shore, 
Is ever going, and yet ne'er is gone. 

Hiding the evening skies, 

Grandly around me rise 
The mighty city's walls, that bind the sight 

To the illumined pave. 

O'er which the shadows wave. 
Afraid to settle on a scene so bright. 



AT THE METROPOLIS. n^ 



Proud City of our Land ! 

Within thy bounds I stand, 
Where once, when thou wert not, the red men stood 

And heard the wild birds soar, 

And watched thy river pour 
Into the sailless sea its unnamed flood ; 

Or, wearied with the chase. 

Lay, in their savage grace. 
Beside the fires that lit their lonely camps. 

While, dense and dark, around, 

A solemn forest frowned 
Where now the air is glowing with thy lamps. 

When restless Progress spurned 

His old restraints, and turned 
From the far Eastern world his vessel's prow, 

His new home here he chose, 

And, swift and fair, uprose 
Beneath his hand these piles that gird me now. 

And now the once lone isle 

Doth with thy presence smile ; 
Freedom's long years have heard thy steeples chime; 

Wealth decks thee with its pride, 

And from thy harbor ride 
Thy freighted ships to visit every clime. 



20 ONWARD ! 

But not for this alone, 

Fair city, art thou known : 
A classic river winds thee in its arms ; 

Beauty within thee glows ; 

Romance around thee throws 
Its loveliness, and history its charms. 

It glads the patriot's heart 

To be with thee ; thou art 
A palace beautiful and vast, — a dome 

Beneath whose thousand spires 

Ambition builds his fires, 
And Art and Commerce have their fostering home. 

New York, February 22, 1865. 



ONWARD! 

Ay ! this is the watchword ! 

This is the cry ! 
Onward ! right onward, 

To do or to die. 

Timid and listless 
Sit not and sigh, 



ONWARD! 121 

While others, more earnest, 
Are passing you by. 

Up with the foremost ! 

Join in the race, 
With the smile of endeavor 

Lighting your face. 

Onward ! press onward ! 

The will makes the way ; 
Life was not meant 

As a pastime or play. 

Join in the struggle. 

With zeal and with strength ; 
As others have conquered, 

^Q you may at length. 

Onward ! right onward ! 

Be one of the few 
Who have courage to dare, 

KwA patience to do. 

t 
Onward ! press onward ! 

For triumph is sweet, 

And the rust of inaction 

Is worse than defeat. 

II* 



THE WAVE. 



THE WAVE. 

(IN IMITATION OF SHELLEY'S "CLOUD.") 

Of the dust he treads man came to be, 

And he calls his mother Earth ; 
But I am born of the wind and sea, 

With the moon to watch my birth. 
He may have his home where I cannot come. 

But the whole wide main is mine ; 
I toss and roll by the southern pole, 

And back to the burning line. 
Like a giant band, the icebergs stand 

To guard the Arctic's portals. 
But I glide by their feet, and flow, till I beat 

On a shore never trod by mortals. 
I cool my brow in the polar snow, 

And backward then I shiver, 
Kissing the mouth, as I wander south. 

Of many a crystal river. 

On the quiet bay I love to play 

When the tired wind gently lingers. 

And its tangled mass of wild sea-grass 
I comb with my salty fingers. 



THE WAVE. 123 

Sunny highlands, and tropic islands, 

Wearing their crowns of palms, 
I sparkle by, till I almost die 

In the regions of the calms. 
Those fervid skies, with their burning eyes, 

I moan and languish under. 
Till I hear afar a noise like war, — 

Its terror and its thunder. 
Then the wild gull shrieks, and her nest she seeks, 

The frightened air grows hotter. 
And the hurricane in his might again 

Comes rushing over the water. 
When, the fiery lightning his forehead bright'ning. 

And his cloudy banners o'er him. 
In his terrible wrath he sweeps on his path. 

Driving the sea before him. 
In his arms so strong he bears me along, 

But I break from his rude embrace. 
And rise like a wall, and totter and fall, 

And fling my foam in his face. 

Oft over my sight streams a signal light, 
And I hear, with the joy of a demon. 

The solemn boom roll deep through the gloom. 
From the gun of the perishing seaman. 

I leap on the deck of the drifting Avreck, 
And drag him into the water, — 



124 ^-^^ WAVE. 



What do I care for his mother's prayer, 
Or the tears of his wife and daughter? 

His bones shall whiten where diamonds brighten 
The lower ocean's floor, 

And the voice of the surge shall be his dirge, 
Sounding for evermore. 

Through secret straits, to the coral gates 

Of the mermaids' palace I roam, 
And gather bright shells from the ocean dells. 

To deck their watery home. 
I mould the sands with my white wet hands, 

And the rough coast dent with scars ; 
I take my hue from the upper blue, 

And double the number of stars. 
When that lady of grace — the moon — her sweet face 

Would behold, she gazes on me ; 
And the sun every day, when the clouds are away, 

On my bosom his image can see. 
I am the child of the breezes wild, — 

The waves of the air, — and brother am I 
To the shining crowds of flying clouds 

That I call the waves of the sky ! 



LIFE THROUGH DEATH. 



125 



LIFE THROUGH DEATH. 

O Death, we fear thee ! All our joys and pleasures 

We feel and hold as thou alone may say : 
In vain, with jealous care, we watch our treasures, 

Thou dost despoil us of them day by day. 
We have our homes, and lovely things around them 

Spring up to gladden and adorn the earth ; 
They bloom not long : too oft, when thou hast found 
them. 

They fade within the hour that saw their birth. 
And when our sun of hope is brightest shining, 

'Tis thy strange joy to shade its beams with night, 
Till gloom surrounds, and e'en the silver lining 

Upon the cloud shows pale unto our sight. 
Affection's golden links are by thee riven, 

That bind us to our good, our fair, our brave, 
As one by one, to thy cold keeping given, 

We bear our loved to the insatiate grave. 

Thou comest nigh, and dear, familiar faces. 

Whose smiles could brighten saddest hours, we miss ; 

We look around, and see the empty places, 

And know 'twas thou who stole from us our bliss. 



126 LIFE THROUGH DEATH. 

When thou dost take what most we would retain, 

And dost our cup with sorrow over-fill, 
Our robbed and wounded hearts may sore complain, 

But thou remainest unrelenting still. 
We fear thee, Death ! but with our fear is mingled 

Something of joy thy terrors cannot quell; 
Though thou for victims hast our fairest singled, 

And cast thy darts at what we loved so well. 
How far were God, what fearful space between 

This low, dim spot and Heaven's higher land, 
Had not the soul, with faith's clear vision, seen 

The wide abyss by thy dark bridges spanned ! 

O'er thy fell work cease, then, thy ghastly grinning, 

Boast not too much of all thy awful powers ; 
Though cruel and strong, the triumphs thou art winning 

Are not all thine, — thy victories are ours. 
For thou dost guide each weary, fainting mortal. 

When thou hast conquered, from the realms of sin \ 
'Tis thy dread hand unbars the heavenly portal 

And leads us to undying life within. 



LINES ON A SKILL. 



127 



LINES ON A SKULL. 

WRITTEN AT THE ACADEMY OF NATURAL SCIENCES, 
PHILADELPHIA. 

Behold ranged yonder, row on row, 

Along the shelves in horrid show, 

Those skulls, which, though no eye is there. 

Seem grimly in our own to stare; 

Which, though they long death's prey have been. 

Have yet enough of life to grin. 

By breath and warmth and soul forsook. 

They make us shudder as we look. 

Yet one, it seems to me, has less 

Of all the common hideousness. 

Something more human I can trace 

Within its white and fleshless face, 

Which death could not, nor yet the worm. 

To utter ugliness transform. 

Though now 'tis but a naked skull, 

It must have been, once, beautiful. 

And if some power could restore 
The living eyes that once it bore, 



2S LAVES 0^' A SKULL. 

What soulfiil light might from them start ! 

And if the lips were there to part,. 

The cheeks to dimple, and the chin 

To catch and hold the dimples in, 

How bright a smile then might we see 

That fixed and ghastly grin could be ! 

The massive and high-builded brow 

Is almost noble, even now, 

And once, clear-flamed and strong, behind, 

There may have glowed the fires of mind. 

And these may oft the tongue have warmed 

Till with its eloquence it charmed, 

Or till, in some great hour, it stirred 

To utter the con\ancing word, 

With whose apt aid, perhaps, was broke 

Some tyrant Error's galling yoke. 

It may have been ; though why at last, 
^^^len earthly things for it were past. 
This head could not be left to rot 
In darkness in some chosen spot. 
Where no wide eye could on it stare, 
I do not know, I do not care. 
I only know the deathless mind 
That fled and left this ruin behind, 
Somewhere within the heavenly zone 
Will find and fill another throne : 



THE BLUE COAT AND THE GRAY. 129 

That He who lit its holy fire 

Will never let the flame expire : 

That when our central shining sun 

His course of glory shall have run, 

And stars and planets cease to turn, 

Somewhere, still bright, that fire shall burn. • 



THE BLUE COAT AND THE GRAY 

A BALL.\D OF THE REBELLION. 

Near fair Virginia's borders 

Two youthful brothers dwelt 
When treason's sad disorders 

First in the land were felt. 
Sons were they of a mother 

Who loved them passing well, 
But brother's heart 'gainst brother 

With hate began to swell. 
For one forgot his country. 

And one to her proved true ; 
One put on the gray coat. 

And one put on the blue. 

The mother blessed the bearer 
Of the loval Union hue, 



I30 



THE BL UE CO A T AND THE GRA V. 

But saw the dreadful error 

That on the other grew. 
By ardent words and tender 

To win him back she strove ; 
He would not make surrender 

Of his ill-chosen love. 
In vain her tears and pleadings; 

She saw them march away ; 
One he wore the blue coat, 

And one he wore the gray. 

God pity her, poor woman ! 

As in her woe she stands. 
If 'gainst a common foeman 

They had but joined their hands. 
No living loyal mother 

Had prouder been to see ; 
But brother against brother ! 

It was too sad to be. 
Led by different captains. 

They marched to join the fray ; 
One he wore the blue coat, 

And one he wore the gray. 

The crimson wave of battle 
Rolled to her very door ; 



THE BLUE COAT AND THE GRAY. 131 

She heard the rifle's rattle, 

The cannon's awful roar. 
Her sick heart in her bosom, 

It beat above the guns : 
*' My boys ! and must I lose them ? 

My brave and darling sons ! 
My heart can know but sorrow 

Whichever wins to-day, 
For one is with the blue coats, 

And one is with the gray." 

At last had ceased the thunder 

That all day long had pealed. 
The sad-faced moon in wonder 

Looked down upon the field. 
What need to tell the horror 

Those soft, sad beams lit up ? 
That anguished mother ! for her 

Remained a bitterer cup. 
Two lifeless forms were borne her 

Before the break of day ; 
One had on the blue coat, 

And one had on the gray. 

She saw them, and she knew them. 
^' My God," she cried in woe, 



132 



THE BLUE COAT AND THE GRAY. 

"■ The blade and ball that slew them 

Oh, let me never know ! ' ' 
Then equally for them caring, 

She laid them in the grave : 
Although the one was erring. 

She knew they both were brave. 
"All bitter memories from me," 

She said, '' I put away ; 
I always loved the blue coat, 

But I cannot hate the gray." 

A spirit like that mother's 

Shall in our bosoms dwell ; 
Xo longer foes, but brothers. 

Are they who fought us well. 
With the grim cannon's rattle 

Let strife and hatred cease ; 
The bravest in the battle 

Are manliest in peace. 
Let every bitter memory 

With the war-cloud fade away : 
Although we love the blue coat, 

We will not hate the gray. 



THE PROMISE. 



^Zl 



THE PROMISE. 

'TwAS December; cold and pallid lay the dead year in 

its shroud, 
Winter snows were fast descending, winter winds were 

wailing loud, 
Winter seas their icy billows tossed beneath a sky of 

cloud. 
Out amid the stormy darkness, on the waters wild and 

wide, 
See, a gallant bark is struggling with the angry arctic 

tide! 
Now she mounts the noisy surges like a thing of life 

and pride, 
Now she sinks into the shadow of the ocean's briny 

wall ; 
Blinded, battling, still she presses onward through the 

tempest's pall, 
While the heaving floods around her, in their fury, rise 

and fall. 
Oh ! the hero-crew that mans her ! Oh ! the hero- 
freight she bears ! 
Oh ! the hearts that beat within her, and the noble 

purpose theirs ! 

12^ 



134 



THE PROMISE. 



Oh ! the spirit that, undoubting, death and danger 
fearless dares ! 

Heaven speeds that gallant vessel, sailing from Oppres- 
sion's realm ; 

Heaven helps her, vainly round her leap the waves to 
overwhelm ; 

Vainly howl the winds above her : God's own hand is 
at her helm. 

'Tis the old heroic story, need we tell it o'er again ? 

Lives the Pilgrim Fathers' glory but in records of the 
pen? 

How they left the land that bore them, where men were 
no longer men ? 

How, where proud Atlantic's waters 'gainst her western 
bounds are hurled, 

They their tyrant-hated banner to the wilderness un- 
furled 

O'er the holy, haunted birth-spot of a new hope for the 
world ? 

Hoary rock ! that first was trodden by the free feet of 
our sires ! 

On thy summit, through the ages, glows the light of 
Freedom's fires, 

At thy base our patriot martyrs strike their silver- 
sounding lyres ; 

Round thee, shades of heroes fallen their protecting 
vigils hold. 



THE PROMISE. 



135 



While above thee flames a Promise, and in shining 

words of gold, 
One by one, the miglity meanings of its prophecies 

unfold ; 
And the trembling nations, reading, gazing in each 

other's eyes, 
Doubting, fearing, half believing, stand with looks of 

wild surprise, 
As the brightness of that promise blazes in the Western 

skies. 

'Tis a promise of a Future, O America, for thee. 

Of a Future far outshining all thy Past has dared to be. 

When shall triumph yet supremer Order, Truth, and 

Liberty. 
Thee, my country, in His goodness has the God of 

nations blessed ; 
Thou hast been a land of refuge for the exiled and 

oppressed, 
Thou hast clothed the cold and naked, and the weary 

given rest. 
Grandly have the years passed for thee since thou hadst 

thy stormy birth. 
Sunny skies have smiled above thee, Flenty poured her 

fullness forth, 
Foes have feared and friends have loved thee for thy 

might and for thy worth. 



136 



THE PROMISE. 



But a prouder day awaits thee, — Plymouth's glad apoc- 
alypse 
Unturned pages of thy story with a purer radiance 

tips, 
And thy deeds in coming ages shall thy olden fame 

eclipse. 
Even now the Old World trembles at the mention of 

thy name, 
While her sad, down-trodden millions, 'mid their 

wretchedness and shame, 
Looking towards thee, feel their bosoms glow with 

Freedom's holy flame. 
And that flame shall glow yet stronger, till their bonds 

are rent apart. 
Till the peasant claims his manhood, and his quickened 

pulses start 
With the fierce, ecstatic throbbing of a new-made free- 
man's heart. 
In the tyrant's breast has entered a strange fear he does 

not own, 
In his midnight dreams he seeth visions of a trampled 

throne, — 
In the harvest of the whirlwind he shall reap as he has 

sown. 
Brighter beams the radiant promise, all the wide earth 

fills with light, 



THE PROMISE. 



137 



Freedom's rosy morn is breaking after tyranny's dark 

night, 
And the noontide of its splendor soon will burst upon 

the sight. 

Lo ! Alas ! the promise darkens, — blood has quenched 

its golden glow, 
Plymouth's mound in gloom is shrouded, and her 

watch-fires smoulder low. 
While from all the land are rising cries of mourning 

and of woe. 
Thus it endeth ! like a comet whirling in its fiery flight 
Fades the vision of our glories from the startled 

nations' sight. 
And the transient dawn is followed by a deeper, 

darker night. 
Once again the aching shackles on the fainting cap- 
tive rust, 
And the poor, despairing peasant eats again his 

mouldy crust. 
Feels his manhood sink within him, cowers lower in 

the dust. 
On his blazoned throne, defiant, sits the tyrant as of 

old; 
Once again his vaulted dungeons their complaining 

victims hold, 



138 THE PROMISE.- 

And once more the stone of bondage 'gainst the prison 
door is rolled. 

Fallen ! fallen ! black the ruins where our ancient bul- 
warks stood, 

Sheathed the blade that once was dripping, gory, in 
defense of good, 

Lost the high, heroic prestige of our noble nationhood. 

Fallen ! fallen ! Europe's monarchs clap their hands in 
hellish glee. 

And with gloating eyes look downward to our pit of 
infamy. 

While the cruel taunt is borne us: ''Who will hence- 
forth call you free?" 

Dark the night of gloom around us, low our sun of 

hope has waned. 
But a cry is loudly ringing: ''Blood and tears our 

freedom gained. 
Blood and tears shall flow yet freer and that freedom 

be maintained. 
We are humbled, but not fallen : still the Lord of 

Hosts we trust ; 
Traitor hordes are gathered round us, burning with a 

murder lust. 
Traitor hands have War's red gauntlet thrown defiant 

in the dust ; 



THE PROMISE. 139 

We accept the bloody challenge, we will meet them on 

the field, 
Right's broad banner floating o'er us, His strong arm 

our only shield, 
With our country's life the issue we are not the first to 

yield !" 

Loud the clash of arms resoundeth, and a million 
marching feet 

Stately step are bravely keeping as the stirring war- 
drums beat, 

And a million men are seeking for the conflict's fiercest 
heat. 

Forth from every teeming valley swift the forming 
legions pour ; 

Slaughter's crimson hand is lifted, and around from 
shore to shore 

A wide continent is shaking with the awful tread of 

War. 
^ -^ •)?. -^ -^ ^ ^ 

When the stormy waves of battle in the after-days are 
stilled, 

Not in vain their blood our heroes on a thousand fields 
have spilled, 

For the Promise to us given shall in brightness be ful- 
filled. 

March 11, 1864. 



40 THE VIlTORY MOXTH—yUL\\ I'i^^l. 



THE VICTORY MONTH— JULY, 1863. 

'TWAS the fairest time of summer, and the hillside and 

the plain 
Were in beauty spangled over with the fields of ripened 

grain, 
And the ministers of Ceres stood with open hand again. 

In the lowland, on the upland, busy reapers toiled 

away, 
And the harvest-fields were merry with their voices 

glad and gay. 
As they worked and sang together through the long, 

warm summer day. 

Happy children in the meadows tossed the scented hay 

about. 
Or they gayly chased each other o'er the fields in 

playful rout. 
While the shaded hills re-echoed their laughter and 

their shout. 



THE VICTORY MONTH— JULY, \%(>i. 141 

But a gloom fell on the reapers, and they paused amid 

their toil, 
For the Southern breezes bore them mutterings of 

strange turmoil, 
And 'twas said that an invader was about to cross their 

soil. 

Even as they paused and listened, from the dark Po- 
tomac's shore 

Came the awful rush of column, with their fronts of 
war, 

And a strange new flag was waving where it never 
waved before. 

Then our proudest cities trembled, and the people 

shook with fear. 
As the cannon's solemn booming fell upon the startled 

ear, 
And the dust-cloud upward rolling told the foe was 

coming near. 

Drum and bugle loud were sounding far and wide their 

fierce alarms, 
And their warning notes went ringing o'er the villages 

and farms ; 
Timid men stood still in terror, and the daring rushed 

to arms. 

13 



142 



THE VICTORY MONTH— JULY, i86: 



Onward went the grim invaders, like a wolf that seeks 

its prey, 
Till they met our own brave legions pressing forward 

to the fray ; 
See, they grapple in the battle ! God assist the Right 

to-day ! 

Rose and fell the tide of conflict, till our glorious natal 

day 
Saw the host that marched to spoil us shorn of all its 

proud array ; 
And the broken bands of foemen down the valleys fled 

away. 

Then the notes of triumph, swelling o'er the land from 
main to main, 

Filled the nation's heart with gladness, — bade it beat 
with hope again ; 

Hark ! a voice from out the distance catches and pro- 
longs the strain ! 

Spoke the lordly Mississippi: "From my sources to 

the sea. 
On the boasted rebel ramparts, stand the soldiers of 

the free, 
And the dear old flag is waving where the traitors used 

to be." 



THE VICTORY MONTH— JULY, i^6z. 143 

From the wilds of far Arkansas, from the hills of Ten- 
nessee, 

Rolled the grand, inspiring chorus of this month of 
jubilee. 

Till the very air was burdened with the shouts of vic- 
tory. 

From her borders, proud Ohio sent her greetings with 

the rest : 
'' He who dared, with fire and plunder, place his foot 

upon my breast, 
I have humbled, and my prison holds the Terror of 

the West." 

With our nation's story written on the highest scroll of 

fame. 
Sing unto the God of Battles praises to His mighty 

name. 
He who watched our fathers over, watches over us the 

same. 



144 



A/V COUNTRY. 



MY COUNTRY. 

Oh ! my country ! my fair country ! blue and smiling 
are thy skies, 

O'er many a distant ocean free thy starry banner flies, 

And a hundred beauteous cities from thy bosom broad 
uprise ; 

Mighty forests bend above thee, shining rivers thread 
the plain. 

Rolling down and down forever to the dark and toss- 
ing main, 

Where thy breezes lift and bear them to their sources 
back again ; 

Mountain breasts have for thee opened, with their 
hidden stores of gold, 

Rainbow showers, in sweet baptism, have descended 
on thy mould. 

Thou hast sown, and in thy harvest gathered in a hun- 
dred fold ; 

From the harbors of Atlantic, where thy commerce 
anchor drops. 

Back thy path of empire lengthens, and its proud march 
only stops 

Where thy eagles flap their pinions on Pac ific's moun- 
tain tops ; 



MV COUNTRY. 145 

In defense of Right and Freedom time has seen thy 

blade drip gory ; 
Fame is thine ; let the wide world search the annals of 

its glory, 
Not a prouder one will find than thine own heroic 

story. 
Oh ! my country ! my fair country ! blest of nature 

and of Heaven ! 
May the dark clouds o'er thee lowering soon afar from 

thee be driven ! 
May thy bitter cup cease flowing and the balm of peace 

be given ! 
Over every hill and valley, from the curling Mexic wave 
To the far shores that the waters of thy brineless oceans 

lave. 
May His mighty arm uplifted, as of old, unite and 

save ! 
Land of noble sires and children of the fearless and 

the free ! 
Ruthless foes may fierce assail thee, yet thy triumph 

still must be. 
And the future holds in waiting some great destiny for 

thee. 



^3* 



46 THE VI RG IX I A HOMESTEAD. 



THE VIRGINIA HOMESTEAD. 

Softly is the river flowing by the old homestead to- 
night, 

Bright the watching stars are glowing, with a mellow, 
old-time light ; 

Renting o'er the gliding waters, white the shrouding 
vapors lie, 

And the distant woods are solemn with the night-bird's 
mournful cry. 

By the bending trees half hidden, the old mansion-house 
is seen : 

O'er its gables climbs the ivy with its graceful wreaths 
of green ; 

But no smoke curls from the chimney, and no lights 
gleam through the panes. 

Round, and in the ancient building, desolation's still- 
ness reigns. 

Where the fountain once was playing, weed and thorn 

have rankly grown. 
And along the garden borders, that no caring hand 

have known. 



THE VIRGIXIA HOMESTEAD. 



147 



Wild grass springs, and briers familiar rudely reach their 

red arms wide, 
And the thistle bold is springing where the timid flowers 

have died. 

Ragged vines drop from the arbors, and the open court- 
yard gate, 

On its hinges damp and rusted, idly hangs its broken 
weight. . 

Where the red brick wall has fallen, moss and mould 
are thick and gray; 

Everywhere the signs are written of the sure work of 
decay. 

All without is gloom and sadness; and within the 

lonely hall 
Moonbeams, shimmering through the window, stand 

like ghosts along the wall, 
While from out the farther corner, where the shadows 

hover thick. 
Slow and solemn, slow and solemn, comes the great 

clock's stately tick. 

And one sad ear to it listens ; every dear one from him 

gone. 
Sits an old man in the darkness, as the weary hours 

drag on. 



148 THE VIRGIXIA HOMESTEAD. 

On his hand his brow is resting, down his cheeks the 

tear-drops start, 
Lone, despairing, he is weeping in his bitterness of heart. 

His was once a happy household ; joy a wife's sweet 

presence made, 
And three sons to noble manhood grew beneath the 

home trees' shade. 
Peace was his, till one red spring-time brought with it 

war's fierce alarms, 
And the brothers left the homestead for the clanging 

field of arms. 

Soon they joined the rebel banner ; one fell early in 

the strife, 
And another's footsteps followed the wild music of the 

fife 
Till the eagles graced his shoulders ; but he wore them 

scarce a day 
Ere Antietam's field of slaughter drank his young life's 

blood away. 

In a grassy dell they laid him, 'neath September's 
fading leaf. 

And the sad tale, told his mother, broke her woman- 
heart with grief. 



THE VIRGINIA HOMESTEAD. 



149 



And the other. — a last letter, that the father's tear- 
dimmed eyes 

Read with fearing haste this evening, open on the table 
lies. 

'* I am hit at last, dear father ; I am cold and faint to- 
night, 

And in this, my dying moment, I have doubted if 
we're right ; 

I have fought the old flag bravely, but this late reflec- 
tion came. 

And I fear what I've called glory is but blackest crime 
and shame. 

** Do not blame me : I see clearly, and I love Virginia 

still. 
But to-night my heart refuses with its old mad hate to 

thrill : 
When you told me they had wronged her, for her sake 

my sword I drew. 
But our eyes are blind with passion, and we know not 

what we do." 

Childless, is the proud man thinking how he loved too 

well his State. 
As in sackcloth and in ashes he is mourning o'er her 

tate: 



ISO 



BREAK THE NEWS GENTLY. 



In the full cup of her sorrow has his sorrow mingled 

in,— 
Darkly hast thou sinned, Virginia, and art suffering for 

thy sin ! 

May, 1864. 



BREAK THE NEWS GENTLY. 

Break the news gently, — 

Charlie is dead, 
Bullet and sabre wounds 

On his young head. 
Lightly the gory locks 

On his brow press; 
Death has one hero more, 

Life has one less. 

It was but yesterday 

That he wrote home : 
*' Look for me, mother dear, 

I will soon come. 
Sad you have waiting been 

All these long years ; 
Let your hopes triumph now 

Over your fears. 



BREAK THE NEWS GENTLY 

" Dark is war's thunder-cloud ; 

Safe from its track 
Soon you will, mother dear, 

Welcome me back. 
We may now think of home, 

Colonel White says, 
For we have yet to serve 

Only two days." 

Only two days to serve ! 

Two days of strife ! 
Ah ! in much shorter time 

Bullets take life. 
Ere the next sunset flamed 

Lurid and red, 
Redder, with mangled brow, 

Charlie lay dead. 

Break gently the sad news 

That you impart. 
Or you may also break 

A human heart. 
Break the news gently, 

Charlie is dead ; 
Damp lie the battle-clods 

Over his head. 



51 



THEIR GRAVES. 

Charlie, so dutiful, 

Handsome, and brave 
And has his valor won 

Only a grave ? 
Has he been spared so long 

Only for this ? 
Must the cruel bullet's touch 

Be his last kiss ? 

And the poor, childless one,- 

Long she will wait, 
Eagerly, anxiously. 

Home by the gate. 
Ah ! who \i411 tell her of 

All she must know? 
Gracious God pity her 

There in her woe ! 



THEIR GRAVES. 

Raise no mausoleum where 
Our dead braves are sleeping ; 

Holds a grateful nation their 
Memory in keeping. 



THEIR GRAVES. 

Lay them in the valleys low, 

By the rolling river, 
Chanting dirges in its flow 

Ever and forever. 

Lay them where the sweetest flowers 

Earliest are springing, 
And the birds from sunny bowers 

Music flights are winging. 
Lay them where the spring will hide 

Each low mound with grasses, 
Where the rose will last have died 

As the winter passes ; 

On the hillside, by the sea, 

Where they've camped or battled ; 
Where their cheers rang loud and free. 

Or their cannon rattled. 
Let their lonely graves be made 

In some distant wildwood ; 
Or beneath the home-tree's shade 

Where they played in childhood. 

Lay them, in their blue coat^ dress'd, 
Where their comrades found them. 

With the sword upon the breast. 
And the flag around them. 



DO 



154 SLAVERY. 

Place the knapsack 'neath the head, 

'Tis a downy pillow, 
And let grow, above the dead, 

Cypress-tree and willow. 

Hew no shaft and lay no stone. 

Raise no sculptured column, 
The wide land is all their own, — 

Holy, haunted, solemn. 
Let the wild winds o'er them shout. 

And the songsters warble ; 
Green their fame shall live without 

Monumental marble. 



SLAVERY. 



The blackest crime that earth has known ! 

The foulest sin that hell can own ! 

A monstrous thing more monstrous grown ! 

A curse to master and to man ! 
A blight to all within its span ! 
To right a foe, to good a ban ! 



SLAl'ERY. 

Can human flesh be changed for gold? 
Can human hearts be bought and sold ? 
Can Christian men such lucre hold ? 

The brute is man's, the man is God's, 
The meanest hind that meanly plods 
Was never born for servile rods ! 

How long, O Time, must freedom be 

With us the vilest mockery ? 

How long^must we stand by and see 

Our eagles perch with drooping wing, 
Our country's right hand withering, 
Because of this accursed thing ? 

If there is power in Heaven's might, 
If day is brighter than the night, 
If wrong is wrong, and right is right. 
This sin must pass from human sight ! 



OD 



156 LINCOLN MONUMENT. 



LINCOLN MONUMENT. 

Yes, let the sacred pile arise 
In memory of our fallen One ; 

His name should be before men's eyes, 
Familiar as the beaming sun. 

Freedom's great cause he well has served, 
And loosened all the painful bands. 

And surely he has well deserved 
This little tribute at our hands. 

Build up the consecrated stone. 
And bid the marble letters tell. 

Of all the martyrs earth hath known 
Few ever proved their faith so well. 

Then lay the shaft, though vainly we 

His fame perpetuate by art \ 
His truest monument will be 

Within a loving people's heart. 



AFTER THE WAR. j^j 



AFTER THE WAR. 

THE OLD FARMER TO HIS WIFE. 

* 

Come out into the sunshine, wife, come out into the 

May, 
And let us sit with happy hearts here in the happy 

day. 
A year ago we hardly dared to hope the time would 

come 
When we our absent boys should see all safe again at 

home. 
Though they so long unhurt had stood and fought be- 
fore the foe, 
We knew not in what hour on them and us would fall 

the blow ; 
For in the distant South, beneath the unfamiliar flowers, 
Lay neighbors' sons in battle slain, and what should 

keep us ours ? 
But still they wrote us they were safe. — to hear it made 

us glad ; 
And though we never could be gay, we were not always 

sad ; 

14* 



158 



AFTER THE WAR. 



But as each spring toward Richmond's walls our men 

were led once more, 
And the great triumph that must come looked nearer 

than before, 
We tried to keep the parents' fear below the patriot's 

pride, 
And willing be to have them there upon the righteous 

side. 
Ah ! those were gloomy days, dear wife ; do you re- 
member now 
How hard it was to always keep the shadows from your 

brow ? 
Once, half-way in a fierce campaign, when Harry sent 

us word 
That he had now his company and wore a captain's 

sword, 
I'm sure to hear it you were proud, and yet you gave a 

sigh, 
And said that captains were as like as privates were to 

die ; 
And when, soon afterwards, we heard John was pro- 
moted too, 
You sadly said he might be dead ere this for all we 

knew. 
But as the cruel strife went on and left us still our own. 
We found that sweet within our breasts a timid hope 

had grown ; 



AFTER THE WAR. 159 

Perhaps their precious blood, we thought, our land will 
not require, 

But their strong arms above, to aid in quenching trea- 
son's fire ; 

And when at last the victory came that we, in faith, so 
long 

Had waited for, no wail for them blent with our grate- 
ful song. 

Why should it be, while neighbor Brown of his four 
sons lost all. 

And neighbor Wilton two of three, that none of ours 
should fall ? 

But safely to us be restored well as they left, and sound, 

Excepting Harry's broken wrist, — the two without a 
wound ! 

Now, there is Will, I do believe he'd just as lief as not 

Bear on his handsome face the mark of rebel blade or 
shot ; 

And John says he is half ashamed to come out of the war 

With both his arms and both his legs and not a single 
scar ! 

But can we be too thankful, wife, to have them as they 
are? 

You know that while they were away one constant fear 
we shared 

Was that, although our children's lives in battle might 
be spared. 



i6o AFTER THE WAR. 

Forever crippled one or more might unto us come 

back, 
As do so many gallant men who follow glory's 

track. 
To give the strong, young limb is hard, even for coun- 
try's sake, — 
Thank God ! such sacrifice our boys were never called 

to make. 
And now they all are here at home ; it seems so strange 

to me 
To have them working on the farm just as they used to 

be. 
This morning, when I first awoke, I felt so stiff and 

old, 
I wondered how much longer I the plow could guide 

and hold, 
Forgetting that their younger hands would give my 

own relief. 
That I no more need sow the seed and bind the harvest 

sheaf. 
Last evening, as John and I were in the corner lot. 
He asked, ''Who drew this furrow here, — you, father, 

did you not?" 
I smiled him ''Yes," and well I knew how gay had 

been his laugh 
Had either Will or Harry drawn one there so crooked 

half. 



AFTER THE WAR. i6i 

He knew the old man's eyes were dim, the old man's 

sight was weak, — 
I thought I saw a tear-drop shine a moment on his 

cheek, — 
And then he said, ** You've worked too hard while we 

have been away. 
But now I promise you shall have a long, long holi- 
day." 
And I cannot be sorry, wife, that day has come at 

last, 
I feel these later years of toil have made me old too 

fast; 
Help was so hard to get, you know, that I was oft alone, 
And then somehow there always seemed so much that 

must be done. 
And weeds would grow so fast around, I got discour- 
aged most ; 
But better twehty crops of wxeds than e'en a skirmish 

lost. 
And while a nation was to save and freedom's fight 

unwon. 
What boy of ours should wield a hoe if he could bear 

a gun ? 
But now the weary years are gone ; oh ! well may we 

rejoice ! 
The silent walls have heard again each dear, familiar 

voice. 



1 62 CONTRASTS. 

The absent soldier-feet have trod once more the fields 

and hearth, 
And ours is now a joyful home if there is one on 

earth. 
So, come into the sunshine, wife, come out into the 

May, 
And let us sit with happy hearts here in the happy day. 



CONTRASTS. 



Five times we watched the spring-tide pass, 
Dropping its violets in the grass. 
Bringing to mountain and meadow shore 
The same sweet life it had brought before. 
As fresh as creation's seventh day 
The earth in its new-born beauty lay, 
Above us the blue, beneath us the green, 
With the bounteous sunshine poured between". 
But what to us were the bloom and light ? 
Over our hearts gloomed a winter night, 
Into our homes a presence had come 
x\nd bidden the voice of mirth be dumb ; 



CONTRASTS. 



163 



Out of our homes a presence had gone,— 

Fathers and brothers, an army as one. 

And ere the last storm blew white from the north 

We saw them march to the battle forth. 

And the earliest flowers could scarcely bud 

Before they were wet with a dew of blood. 

And the slow, sad winds swelled up from the south, 

Heavy with smoke from the cannon's mouth. 

II. 

But a glad change came, — no more in fear 
We wait while the spring renews the year. 
The roll of drums no longer we hear, 
The call to arms and the martial tread, 
But the peaceful hum of toil instead. 
No more to the glowing summer air 
The torch of the raider adds its glare. 
The autumn comes like a glorious ghost, 
But its banners herald no hostile host. 
The white tents of winter alone we see 
Where those of the soldier used to be. 
The frozen earth hears no charging tramp. 
No sentry watches the chilly camp. 
Oh, if war and its woes we could but say 
Have passed forever from earth away ! 
In the calms of peace sometimes we note 
The spiders' webs in the cannon's throat. 



64 CONTRASTS. 

Ah ! peace itself, oft as frail as they, 

May be in a moment blown away ; 

For still the sword guards throne and state, 

And the idle batteries grimly wait, 

Ready their ruin red to pour 

O'er blue sea wave and prosperous shore. 

But long, my country, may it be 

Ere the burst of battle startle thee. 

Till the last, last hope of peace is gone. 

Never again be thy good sword drawn ; 

But to bloodless victories lead the way, 

As the great sun leads the hours of day. 

Then the happy nations, bright as they. 

Shall step by step toward heaven advance. 

Leaving their cruel ignorance 

Dim behind, like a dream of night 

Rayed across by the morning light. 

Then civilization shall indeed 

Be a glorious fact, — 'tis now a need ! 



7 HE NAMELESS GRAVE. 



65 



THE NAMELESS GRAVE. 

Apart from all the rest 'twas made, 

In a neglected corner ; 
It looked as if who there was laid 

Had died without a mourner. • 
No date was on the small red stone 

That had commenced to crumble ; 
No line by which it might be known 

Who filled that mound so humble. 

Above the other graves was seen 

The marble gleaming whitely ; 
This was not even clothed with green, 

But briery and unsightly. 
The barren moss had crept across 

In cold, dead gray to hide it; 
No pleasant tree to blow there was, 

No flower to smile beside it. 

With difficult and cautious tread 

No certain path led to it j 
'Twas plain no mourner sought that bed 

With frequent tears to dew it. 
15 



i66 THE NAMELESS GRAVE. 

I left the spot, my spirit sad 
To think that one could perish, 

As that forgotten mortal had, 
And leave no thing to cherish. 

Oh, where is he who would not have. 

When clay enfolds his coffin, 
Some hand to keep alive his grave, 

Some tongue to name him often ? 
Ah ! it is pleasant but to know, 

When death has sealed our lashes, 
Some sparks of memory yet will glow 

Above our fireless ashes. 

When I at last this form resign 

To be with earth reblended. 
Unlike that nameless grave be mine, 

At least by nature tended. 
To bloomless vegetation dull 

Let not my dust be given, 
But to some flower beautiful, 

Or glad green tree of heaven. 



THE OLD MILL. 167 



THE OLD MILL. 

Go you to Braineton road, and wind 

Where it will lead you down the hill, 
And suddenly it ends, you find. 

Before an ancient country mill. 
For sixty years its walls have been 

In rain and sunshine growing gray, 
And all its roof with moss is green 

As any meadow is in May. 
Wide open hangs the dusty door. 

And swings and trembles in the sound 
Of noisy wheels that have for more 

Than fifty years the harvest ground. 
Through summer's heat, through winter's coldj 
As steady as the seasons rolled. 

Oh ! often I with playmate band, 

In summer days let loose from school, 
Have turned aside to come and stand 

And hear the great wheels splashing cool ! 
And the old miller kind, who knew 

Well what our childish lips would ask, 
Sometimes would come and lead us through 

The place when he could leave his task. 



1 68 THE OLD MILL. 

A gentle, good old man was he ; 

But once we missed his snowy head, 
And when we asked where he might be, 

With awe we heard that he was dead. 
But round and round, and round and round. 
The wheels still whirled with busy sound. 

And often now around the mill 

In pleasant hours I love to stray. 
For nature chiefly rules there still. 

And has her sweet, unfettered way. 
The brook calls gayly from its bed. 

The birds join in with joyous tune. 
And the close cedars o'er my head 

A twilight soft make of the noon. 
But as my brow, in daytime dreams. 

Against the grassy sod I press, 
A voice falls on my ear and seems 

To chide me for my idleness. 
As round and round, and round and round. 
The wheels are whirled with busy sound. 

I linger where the water steals 
Along the alders dark and slow. 

To tread with silver feet the wheels. 
Then join its sister floods below. 



THE OLD MILL. 

I watch it through the hazels wild 

Glide in and out like some gay elf, 
And like at play a single child, 

I hear it talking to itself. 
O'er the brown arches of the bridge 

I hear the happy swallows call ; 
The robins hopping by the hedge, 

And the old mill above them all. 
As round and round, and round and round. 
Its wheels are whirled with busy sound. 

And when the frosts have touched the hill. 

Until with fire it seems to blaze, 
Again I seek the lonely mill, 

Dim standing in the purple haze. 
Like wounded birds, the autumn leaves 

The smoky air are falling through. 
And in my breast my spirit grieves 

To think that friends are falling too. 
For of the merry group that played 

Where yonder wheels revolving sweep. 
Five have I seen in darkness laid. 

To take their last, eternal sleep. 

And so it is in life, I say ; 

Friends one by one around us drop, 
15^ 



169 



lyo 



ONL V A LITTLE WHILE. 

And they are gone and we are gray, 

And yet Time's wheels can never stop. 
In vain a moment's pause we crave; 

Still ever, ever turn they must. 
Till, rolling swift across the grave. 

They grind our breathless forms to dust. 
The world grows old, the frost of years 

Is gathering white upon its head ; 
Its children toil in pain and tears. 

Or slumber sweetly with the dead. 
While round and round, and round and round, 
Time's wheels still turn with ceaseless sound. 



ONLY A LITTLE WHILE. 

Only a little while, — 
A gasp of feeble breath, 

A smile, a sigh, and then — 
Death — death ! 

Only alittle while, — 

A few things done and said. 

And heart and hand will be 
Dead — dead ! 



ONL V A LITTLE WHILE. . 

Only a little while, — 

A transient, troubled day. 

Then 'neath the coffin lid. 
Clay — clay ! 

Only a little while, — 

A gleam, a blush of light. 

Then, o'er our earthly skies, 
Night — night ! 

Only a little while, — 
Let us but do our best. 

The end of all shall be 
Rest — rest ! 

Only a little while, — 

And peace will follow strife ; 
And we through death shall find 

Life— life ! 



171 



^ 



172 



WORK. 



W O R K. 

Sit not with folded hands and wait 
For what the day may bring ; 

Did men more earnest act, then fate 
AVere less a dreaded thing. 

The coward only is deterred 

By destiny's weak rules ; 
Chance is a name, and luck a word 

That's known alone to fools. 

On fortune's sea think not to swim 

Atop of every wave. 
But keep thy life-bark well in trim, 

Be patient and be brave ! 

For courage is a talisman 
Most potent and most true ; 

And patience — ask not what she can. 
But what she can not do. 

The work must be in part thy own 
If thou wouldst wear the crown. 

Prayer and fast will not alone 
Sufi&ce to bring it down. 



A RHYME OF CHEER. 173 



A RHYME OF CHEER. 

Oh, friends ! what works are by us done 
In gloom that are our gaining? 

What triumphs have we ever won 
By sighing and complaining? 

Why should we, when the tempest shrouds, 

Sit down in vain repining, 
Forgetting that, above the clouds, 

The heavens still are shining ? 

Unthinking that if it were not 

For dark and rainy hours 
The sunshine, falling fierce and hot. 

Would wither all the flowers. 

It may be sad truth when we say 
That evil times have found us. 

But surely night cannot alway 
Its shadows hold around us. 

Let us look up, where, bright above, 
Hope's morning star is gleaming. 

Cheer each faint heart with words of love, 
And waken from our dreaminir. 



174 



THE WORLD AND I. 

And let us not anticipate 

Our future cares and sorrows, 

But live through dark to-days, and wait 
The dawn of bright to-morrows. 

Nor grasp for joys that they may bring 
With eagerness o'erweening, 

Remembering that the brightest spring 
May slowest be in greening. 



THE WORLD AND I. 

The world and I have been of late 

Content to -live and move apart ; 
We do not bear each other hate, 

And yet have little love at heart. 
We ne'er were friends, and since I told 

Its pleasure is but pleasant pain, 
It has been pleased to call me cold. 

And I, in turn, have called it vain. 

The princes of successful trade. 
And fashion's giddy throngs, I see 

Pass by, in all their proud parade. 
Nor deign to cast a glance at me. 



THE WORLD AXD J. 

I do not envy them their gold ; 

Their pomp and glitter scarce could please : 
For, easier won and kept, I hold 

That there are better things than these. 

Those who are titled great I hear 

The fickle, noisy crowds applaud ; 
Ah me ! they often do, I fear. 

Think more of men and less of God. 
With pride the warrior's brow receives 

The laurel wreath ; but I, with pain. 
Look only where, upon its leaves, 

A brother's blood has left its stain ! 

I have ambition in my breast, — 

But it is not for power and fame ; 
I walk in silence from the rest. 

And humbly bear my humble name. 
I see the sails of navies spread, 

I see the smoke of cities curled ; 
But neither is above my head. 

And what am I to all the world ? 

I dwell as by a quiet bay : 

I hear the outside billows roar ; 
But well I know that never they 

Can break against my peaceful shore. 



76 



^'HOME AND abroad:' 

And if my walls shut in sweet sights 
The world can never hope to see, 

And I've no share in its delights, 
Oh, what is all the world to me ? 



''HOME AND ABROAD." 

INSCRIBED TO W. P. T. 

The heart of him who loves to roam 

O'er strange, new lands and stormy brine. 

But still keeps tender thoughts of home, 
Is kin to mine. 

And him whose great joy is to let 

At his own hearth his wandering end. 

Although we never may have met, 
I call my friend. 

Thou' St stood where lowly Afric' weeps 

Alone upon her desert sands, 
And in the mocking ocean steeps 

Her poor, bound hands. 



''HOME AND abroad:' 

By river fair, by mount and main, 
Imperial Europe thou hast trod ; 

On many a history-haunted plain 
And classic sod. 

But whether dust is on thy feet, 
Or they are wet with ocean's foam, 

Still mingles with thy song that sweet 
Refrain of home. 

Beneath those alien skies to kneel 
At glory's and at beauty's shrine 

Is holy pleasure, which to feel 
Was often thine. 

But after it had thrilled thy breast. 
Oh, didst thou not with rapture learn 

Another joy, worth all the rest, — 
That of return ? 



i6 



177 



1 78 FLOWERS OF PALESTINE. 



FLOWERS OF PALESTINE. 

(Written on seeing a beautiful* bouquet of flowers from the Holy- 
Land.) 

Fair stranger flowers ! I love your bloom and green, 

For ye are children of that sacred sod 
Whereon, in time long past, the feet have been 
Of the incarnate God. 

And ages after He had drank the cup 

Of earthly woe and joined His cherubim, 
Your beauteous forms to life and light sprang up, 
As should our faith in Him. 

Ye are our teachers, flowers ! I may not stand 

Upon the shores where your fair sisters blow. 
But that rare loveliness is in that land 

By your sweet selves I know. 

And, flowers, ye give me faith, — I cannot stand 

Upon the shores of centuries ago. 
But that our Christ was then within the land 
By Christian love I know. 



DOWN BY THE MILL. 



179 



DOWN BY THE MILL. 

Down by the mill, where the buttercups grew, 

Giving the meadows a golden hue, — 

Another field of the Cloth of Gold, 

Like that in England's history told, — 

Oft I wandered when life was new, 

Down by the mill, where the buttercups grew. 

The little live brook ran rippling by, — 

Which was the happiest, it or I ? 

The breeze, with ceaseless summer sound. 

Like an airy river flowed around, 

And the happy woods thrilled through and through, 

Down by the mill, where the buttercups grew. 

Overhead the sky, like a bright blue bay. 

Shored by the hill-tops, wound away ; 

Early the evening shadows fell 

Cool across that beautiful dell ; 

Long on the grass lay the morning dew, 

Down by the mill, where the buttercups grew. 

Never the hours shall be forgot 

That I lived in that lonely and lovely spot. 



i8o THE RUINED HOME. 

Oh for a breath of the fragrant air 

That I know is softly blowing there ! 

For a single hour of the peace I knew 

Down by the mill, where the buttercups grew ! 



THE RUINED HOME. 

Dull through the night its windows stare, 

Its hearth is dark and cold ; 
It stands forlorn, as if aware 

That it is lone and old. 

Like lower stars before it gleam 
The lamps that light the town ; 

Above, the moon in one broad beam 
Looks in cold pity down. 

Its roof is clad with heavy snow, 
And through its broken doors 

The whitened wind has dared to blow 
And drift the cheerless floors. 

Ay, on the spot where once the wave 
Of household light flowed warm. 



THE RUINED HOME, i8i 

A snow-drift like a winter grave 
Is moulded by the storm. 

Silence would be in every room 

Were not the winds at strife ; 
They beat about, and make the gloom 

Seem full of ghostly life. 

With every movement of the blast 

Old voices call around \ 
Old forms come thronging from the past, 

Invisible as sound. 

But such sweet presence lacks its proof; 

The time was long ago 
When summer rain beat on that roof, 

And happy hearts below. 

Such once were there, but now they all 

Are dead or far away ; 
Comfort no more will cheer that hall. 

Nor pleasure make it gay. 

Thus all that Death can claim as his 

He follows to destroy. 
And, oh ! how willing Silence is 

To hush the notes of joy ! 
1 6* 



1 82 THE RUIXED HOME. 

How soon the birds that sweetest sing 
Forsake the summer's bowers ! 

How easily the hand of spring 
Is loosened from her flowers ! 

How soon the beautiful and bright 

Surrender to decay ! 
How closely does the black-winged night 

Pursue the flying day ! 

But never all the world at once 

By darkness is possessed ; 
Some half our planet always fronts 

The sky with lighted breast. 

Let cheerful hands still plant and build, 
Although their works are frail, 

And time to overthrow them skilled, 
For every hill and vale 

Must be a desert or a home ; 

Earth has no vacant spot. 
And death and loneliness will come 

Where life and love are not. 



THE LOST SHIP. 



i«3 



THE LOST SHIP. 

Once a vessel left our bay 

In the morning's beaming; 
Oh ! how proud she moved away. 
With her pennon waving gay 
And her white sails gleaming ! 

'Twixt as and the sun, each mast 

Swayed with stately motion, 
As, before the west wind, fast 
O'er the harbor bar she passed 
For the southern ocean. 

Loudly from her full deck she 

Sent her farewell cheering, — 
Glad that vessel seemed to be 
That the rough and open sea 
She once more was nearing. 

From the low coast's highest rise 

Sailors' wives and daughters 
Watched her with their straining eyes, 
Till they lost her where the skies 
Touched the tossing waters. 



1 84 THE LOST SHIP. 

Thus she left that sun-bright shore,- 

Left it, and forever ; 
For across the torrid main 
To those waiting ones again 

Came that vessel never. 

With half-happy, anxious hearts 
They went forth to greet her, 
When 'twas time for her to come 
From her distant wand'ring home; 
But they did not meet her. 

Weary weeks went by while they 

Watched and hoped and waited. 
Looking down the peaceful bay. 
Peering through the far-away. 
For that ship belated. 

Hard it was for wife and maid 

To accept their sorrow. 
For awhile they fondly said, 
''She has only been delayed ; 
She will come to-morrow. ' ' 

But to-morrow came, and still 
Saw they not her pennon ; 



THE LOST SHIP. 185 

List'ning, day by day they stood, 
But their quick ears never could 
Hear her signal cannon. 

How she perished none could tell ; 

For the years, slow gliding, 
Of the fate of that good ship 
Nothing learned from page or lip, 

Heard no tale or tiding. 

Had she struck a hidden rock ? 

Or, with flame and thunder, 
Had a hurricane in wrath 
Swept her from its fearful path ? — 

We could only wonder. 

When her brave crew found their graves 

Little has it mattered ; 
Down beneath the noisy waves. 
Somewhere in the ocean caves. 

Their white bones are scattered. 

Long within the sailor's cot 

There were tears and sighing ; 
Now the tale is half forgot, 
And in yonder churchyard spot 

Are the mourners lying. 



1 86 SILENCED. 

Let us trust that sailor band, 

Maiden, wife, and mother,—^ 
Those who died by sea and land,- 
On some higher, happier strand 
See again each other. 



SILENCED. 



A DAY is dark and sad to me ; 

But smiling hope comes softly near 
And gently whispers in my ear, 

'' To-morrow shall be bright for thee." 

To-morrow comes ; I cannot fling 
My little heart-aches all aside. 
And so, I say that hope has lied. 

And is at best a cheating thing. 

Sorrow's pale mists still shroud my morns, 
And, murmuring to myself, I say : 
" Sure all along life's weary wa^y 

The flowers are fewer than the thorns. 

" Our pleasures have their bitter pain, 
Our triumphs end in our defeat. 



''BURY ME IN THE SUNSHINE r 

Our friendship is but masked deceit, 
And our whole life is vain, is vain." 

But shame has voice ; then if I but 
Do count my blessings, not my cares, 
Sweet peace comes to me unawares,— 

The wide gate of complaint is shut. 

And thus I end with praiseful air 
The lay my lips began with sighs : 
It only needs impartial eyes 

To see some goodness everywhere. 



187 



''BURY ME IN THE SUNSHINE." 

(These were the dying words of the late Archbishop Hughes.) 

Bury me in the sunshine ; 

Let the smiling face of day, 
And not the shadowy darkness, 

Look last upon my clay. 

Bury me in the sunshine ; 

Let no wild tempest frown 
Between me and the heavens 

When to rest you lay me down. 



''BURY ME IN THE SUNSHINE r 

Bury me in the sunshine ; 

From the blue heights of the skies 
Let the daytime's fullest glory 

Beam o'er my sightless eyes. 

Bury me in the sunshine ; 

I long not for its glow 
Because I fear the stillness 

Of the lonely bed below ; • 

But because in life I loved it, 

And I would have it be 
Wherever on earth's bosom 

You make a grave for me. 

Bury me in the sunshine ; 

'Tis the gleam of heaven's dome, 
And it will light my spirit 

On its happy journey home. 



TEARS. 



189 



TEARS. 



Long ago, long ago, 

Ah ! Earth remembers well 
From our mourning mother's eyes, 
On the dews of Paradise, 

The first tear fell, — 
The first of human woe ! 

Since then, since then 

From the eyes and hearts of men 
How full has been the flow ! 

II. 

Tears of joy, tears of pain, 

Some as sad as on the leaf 
Drops the dreary autumn rain. 

With a patient, meek despair ; 

Some like April showers, brief. 
When the opening heavens again 

Show even more fair. 

Oh, delicious, balmy grief! 
17 



190 



TEARS, 

A kind of bliss thou art. 

Thy drops destroy no bloom ; 
Tears that never outward start, 
But fall inward on the heart, — 

These sear and consume. 

III. 

Alas ! the tears we see 

Are not the half that fall. 
We hide our misery, — 

God only knoweth all. 
The face puts on a smile, 
Yet all the weary while 

The heart tastes gall. 

We mask our deepest woes, 
For bitterer tears are shed 
For the living than the dead. 

That no one knows. 

IV. 

O Earth ! there comes a day 

When a sweet voice from on high 
Shall beam downward through the sky, 
Fresh from heaven, and say : 
" Weep no more ! weep no more ! 
For the living nor the dead ; 



THE WEEPING CHILD. 

Sorrow's long, long night is o'er, 

The last tear shed !" 
But how many years, 
But how many tears. 

Before those words are said ! 



19T 



THE WEEPING CHILD. 

Why dost thou weep ? 
What thought has filled thy little breast with pain ? 
What hast thou lost that thou didst hope to gain, 

That thou shouldst steep 
Tliy cheek of rose in sorrow's bitter rain ? 

Each curious toy. 
That thou once handled with such fond delight, 
Lies now uncared for in thy tearful sight. 

Tell me, my boy. 
What full-faced woe has put thy peace to flight ? 

Within thy breast • 
Thy heart is fluttering like a prisoned bird ; 
Unto its depths thy feelings' fount seems stirred, 

And thou hast pressed 
My hand away, with comfort's voice unheard. 



192 THE WEEPING CHILD. 



Thy trouble draws 
Itself still closer to thyself. Ah, well ! 
I will not wound a wound and bid thee tell 

The secret cause 
That, with this sobbing, makes thy bosom swell. 

It is not much ; 
Laughter and shout will soon again be thine ; 
Thy grief forgot, thou wilt no more repine ; 

Yet is its touch 
On thy young heart like heavier ones on mine. 

We are unlike ; 
That one is strong proves not the other so, — 
The grief that breaks and has its briny flow 

Doth never strike 
Deep in the soil its poisoned fangs of woe. 

Then weep, my child ; 
To thee 'tis given to know the balm of tears ; 
Thy pain is not an inward one that sears, — 

Thou hast e'en smiled, 
And to thee bright once more the day appears. 



THE SUMMER-TIME IS OVER, 



193 



THE SUMMER-TIME IS OVER. 



The summer-time is over, — 
It has had its fragrant growth, - 

The leaf is on the clover, 

And the snow is on them both. 



The winds are southward blowing. 

The sunny days are few, 
And the nights, so long in going. 

Bring us frost instead of dew. 

III. 

But though earth be at its drearest. 
And the outward light depart, 

There's another sujp.imer, dearest, — 
We will keep it in the heart. 

17^ 



194 



FAITH AND LOVE. 



FAITH AND LOVE. 

It may be, dear one, ere our lives are done 

We shall lose our hearts' sweet mood ; 
For it seems to be man's choice to see 

The evil before the good. 
The kindest word may be lightly heard. 

The sun of a smile soon set. 
But the deed of wrong is remembered long ; 

The sneer is hard to forget. 

Let us live in the light and rule by the might 

Of love, for I think we can ; 
But come what will, let us keep with us still 

A faith in our fellow-man. 
For he whose heart has felt the world's smart 

Till he never can trust again, 
Had better be dead, in his cold grave-bed. 

Than along with lii/ing men. 



THE ANGEL OF SUNSET. 



195 



THE ANGEL OF SUNSET. 

Beside the sunset's golden gates 

An angel waits, 
As through them every eve the day doth go, 
And, ere it treads the silent lands, 

Of it demands 
The story of its hours to know; 
And, taking then his pen of light, 

With it doth write 
(In lines that will undimmed appear 
When all that earthly hands have traced 

Shall be effaced) 
Whate'er of good or evil he may hear. 

And when each glad, each faltering word 

At last is heard. 
And to the deathless pages given, 
With smiling or with pitying look 

He shuts the book 
And hands the record up to heaven. 
Of all that he has written there 

'Tis ours to bear 
The glory or the bitter shame ; 



96 NEVER AG A IX. 

He is not merciful, but just ; 

Oh, let us trust 
In heaven's high court it will not be the same ! 



NEVER AGAIN. 

The clouds by-and-by will break and fly ; 

We shall see the grass where the snow-flakes lie, 

And the hillsides wave with grain ; 
But the loving face at the old home door, 
And thy fairy form on the old home floor, 

Never again — never again. 

The buds will pout and the blossoms come out ; 
We shall hear the happy birds singing about, 

And the patter of summer rain ; 
But thy gentle footsteps coming near. 
And the sweet, sweet voice we used to hear, 

Never again — never again. 

We shall feel the glow that the noon-skies throw, 
And the tenderer light that calms us so 

As the tranquil sunsets wane ; 
But the hand whose touch was always soft. 



J^FST-SOXG. 

And the lips whose kiss was felt so oft, 
Never again — never again. 

O'er sea and isle the summer will smile 
And we may, too, for a little while, 

If only to hide our pain ; 
But through it all we will think of thee. 
And the world will be as it used to be 

Never again — never as^ain. 



197 



REST-SONG. 



Rest thou, rest thou, weary one ; 
Yonder comes the wakening sun, 
But the morning, bright and blue, 
Brings no work for thee to do. 
Rest thou, rest thou, weary one, 
For thy work on earth is done. 

Done, and well done, faithful heart ; 
Thine was no neglected part ; 
And the world to-day we see 
Better is, because of thee. 



198 J^ EST- SONG. 

Rest thou, rest thou, weary one. 
All thy work on earth is done. 

We have known thee to complain ; 
Not of aching hands and brain, 
Not of the burden thou didst bear, 
But that thou couldst not others' share. 
Rest thou, rest thou, weary one. 
For thy work on earth is done. 

''Rest thou, rest thou," some did say, 
E'en while shone thy earthly day. 
But to such thy sweet lips said : 
''What but that when I am dead ?" 
Rest thou, rest thou ; but in heaven 
Living rest shall thee be given. 



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